Staff Leave: Mitigate Lost Time in 2025
The deadline to use or lose leave was December 31, 2024.
Paychecks dated January 1, 2025 will reflect the 2024 annual leave balance prior to applying any caps or adjustments. Annual leave taken in 2024 must be entered by pay period ending 12/31/2024 to apply to the 2024 balance. Manual leave adjustments will be made on the pay period ending 1/15/2025 for employees who did not take their required amount of annual leave and to apply annual leave cap. The paycheck dated January 31, 2025 will reflect the annual leave balance after applying any adjustments for 2024.
If any of your staff members lost leave, take this as a learning opportunity to help prevent your employee from losing leave in 2025.
Supervisors of benefited employees are responsible for ensuring their employees have taken minimum required 40 hours in a year (prorated if less than 1 FTE) and will not have over 240 hours (prorated) in their annual leave balance. The 40 hour requirement does not apply if it is the first calendar year of their employment.
How to mitigate the amount of “lost” time
Review Planned Leave
Visit with your employee at the beginning of the year to identify when they can take their required 40 hours (pro-rated for part-time employees). This will assist your department in scheduling around vacations and ensure the team is prepared for their absence. Additionally, encourage your employee to forecast their end of the year leave balance to identify how many additional hours they may have to use beyond the 40 required. Note: forecasting does not work for hourly employees.
- Have the employee log into PeopleSoft HCM at https://adminsys.ndus.edu/psp/hehp/?cmd=login&languageCd=ENG
- Select Employee Self Service
- Select the Time Tile
- Select Absence Balances
- Select Forecast Balance
- Change the As of Date to 12/31/2025
- In the Absence Name field, use the drop down and select Annual Leave
- Click on the Forecast Balance button – this usually takes a few seconds to compute
- When the balance appears, subtract 240 hours to see the use-or-lose amount. (Prorate for part time)
Submit Leave in HCM
Ensure your employees are submitting their time in HCM, as soon as they have used it. This ensure the forecast calculations are correct, assisting your employee.
Encourage Additional Leave
If your employee is still above the cap, identify days that will work for your department for them to take additional leave. Once you and your employee have identified additional leave hours to be used, subtract these hours from the employee’s annual leave balance to calculate if the employee will be below the use-or-lose cap by the deadline.
Consider Leave Donation
If an employee is unable to use their leave prior to the deadline, employees who have been approved to receive donated leave would greatly appreciate any donations of the use or lose leave. Contact Joanne Barstad for information on donating to specific employees or the General Leave Donation Pool. Employees are in need throughout the year, and donations are sought year round.
Questions?
If you or a staff member are interested in donating leave or have any questions regarding the use-or-lose process, contact Joanne Barstad, joanne.barstad@UND.edu or 701.777.2156.
