resu

Is it true that companies in America only give one week of vacation a year (and no vacation at all during your first year)?

What about christmas?

What about exceptions.. ex when you are getting married and want to go away for a week, funerals etc?

Thanks,
Ola

Pimpbot

Depends which company you work for. Holiday is more limited over here. But having said that, one manager I interviewed with had 7 weeks vacation a year due to being with the company for over 10 years.

ironporer

That is almost unheard of anymore. A "normal" schedule (for a salaried employee) would be something like what I get:
1st year= 1 week after 6 mo on job
2nd year=2weeks
5 years=3 weeks
10years=4 weeks

No more than 2 weeks consecutive, unless God and the Holy Ghost approve (never happens)

For hourly here they get 1 week after 1 year; 2 weeks after 5, 3 weeks after 10.

Pimpbot

My wife was just recently given a third week of vacation on her 5th year anniversary of working with the company.

ElsieTheMaid

We get 2 weeks after the 1st year, then 3 weeks after 2 years, it goes up again at 10 yrs I think. We also shut down for almost 2 weeks over xmas. My company is very generous!

Oggie Oi!

It all depends on your field and location.

I have worked for three organizations in Washington DC and it has been the same at each place - 3 weeks vacation that can be used anytime after the start date. At my current job, I went to Thailand for a fortnight after working for only two months.

Also, because my work is closely tied to Congress, I get about another 20 days off because of obscure Federal holidays and government events. It is not a bad deal, actually.

That said, I have many DC friends in the private sector who are kept on a short leash. Profit driven companies need to maintain productivity and don't like employees being away too often.

Lion in Winter

On the productivity thing, I seem to remember reading that productivity in the US in fact isn't any higher, perhaps even lower, than European countries with up to 8 weeks of vacation and shorter work weeks. Something about happy employees producing more, not throwing sickies, etc

Oggie Oi!

Actually, I don't disagree with that. My organization seems to be just as, if not more, productive than my friends' companies that allow only limited vacation time.

Scarlett-Dallas

I'm pretty lucky, vacation-wise.

I get 10 days off between Christmas and New Year plus the usual national holidays. In addition to that I get 12 days vacation and 12 days sick a year, plus two personal days that I can take whenever I want. For the US that's not a bad deal at all. The pay's crap but the people are great, and I'd rather have the time than the money, if I have to choose.

The first job I was offered said I would have 5 days vacation and 3 sick per year, and I laughed and said no thanks. Later I learned that for here it was a not unusual deal. I was offered that job about a week after I started applying so I didn't think I'd have a problem if I turned it down. HA! Took me ages to get another offer of a full-time job with benefits, and I kicked myself for quite a while as I ran between two part-time jobs.

Still, all's well that ends well.

Regards
-=-
Scarlett

TexasPenguin

Depends if you are talking 'holiday' or 'vacation'. We Brits thought the two words meant the same thing, eh?
Christmas is a 'holiday', Boxing Day (if you took it off) would be a 'vacation'!
Guess I'm lucky, I effectively 'transferred' from a UK company and so brought my 5 weeks 'vacation' with me even though the official company rules would have given me only 1 week in the first year (and nothing at all untill I'd 'earned' the hours off!).

Andy.

AlisonPA

You are right about the "vacation" and "holiday" being different over here and the same in the UK. I used to get 28 days holiday in the UK. Now it's one week first year, two weeks second year and three weeks third year. We get 6 sick days and 6 "floating" days + public holidays of course. And my hours are 8:30am to 5:00pm and everyone goes at that time - I have the same level job too and I used to work for 7:15am to 6pm in the UK and the travelling was much longer. I prefer working in the US.

Duncan Roberts

I get 2 weeks of vacation fro the first January after I was hired, plus after 3 months I get 7 national holidays and 4 sick/personal days.
I just got promoted so I was able to bargain a holiday over christmas into the dael, but that was unusual.

NC Penguin

There is quite a bit of variation in the number of paid holidays employees get in the US.

This is dependant on:
industry
employee status (exempt or non-exempt)
geographic location within the US (or so I'm lead to believe)
type of employer (commercial, government, non-profit, etc.)

Paid time off for funeral leave and other types of non-standard leave vary from employer to employer.

If you're really interested, I would suggest reading up about FMLA (Family and Medical Leave Act).

resu

Thank y'all for the help. It seems like it all depends on your own ability to find a good job..

This forum is great and I get less and less nervous about my U.S. plans for each question I get answered.. thanks alot.

Cheers,
Ola (Sweden / U.K. and in a year or so U.S.)

USBound

I get 15 days vaca + 2 weeks at xmas + standard american random days. Not taken any sickies at all yet BUT.. on guy here is about to go on hols for a month.. so.. it does increase (he's been here 9 years).

andy