News

Paid Time-Off Benefits Survey

More flexibility for PTO programs

June 17, 2008 | Leigh Culpepper and Jeremy Greenup

When designing a competitive and comprehensive total rewards plan, it is important to consider the value of paid time-off (PTO) benefits to employees and the cost to your organization. Results from a recent Culpepper Benefits Survey show that an increasing number of employers are improving their PTO benefit programs by making them more flexible and generous. (A demographic breakdown of survey participants is provided in the box at the end of this article.)

Types of Paid Time-Off Models Used

Most surveyed organizations (56 percent) use a traditional PTO model with days allocated to specific categories (e.g., vacation, holiday, sick & personal leave), while 41 percent have PTO bank models combining vacation, sick and personal days into one pool, allowing employees to take time-off for any reason.

In addition, 18 percent of companies allow employees to cash out unused vacation and PTO days.

Types of Paid Time-Off Models Used
	Traditional Model with specified # of sick & personal days	Traditional Model without specified # of sick or personal days	PTO Bank	Other Models
All Companies	45%	11%	41%	3%
Number of Employees
Up to 100	46%	8%	42%	4%
Over 100 to 1,000	45%	12%	42%	1%
Over 1,000	41%	16%	38%	5%
Industry Sector
Technology	47%	9%	42%	2%
Life sciences	50%	10%	38%	2%
Other	30%	22%	39%	9%
Corporate Status
Private	45%	9%	42%	4%
Public	50%	14%	35%	1%
Not-for-profit	43%	28%	29%	0%

Paid Time-Off Eligibility Periods

Fifty-two percent of companies allow new full-time employees to take paid time-off immediately on hire. One-third of companies require new employees to wait over 30 days before they can take paid time-off.

Paid Time-Off Eligibility for New Full-Time Employees
Immediate upon hire	52%
2 to 30 days	14%
91 to 180 days	13%
61 to 90 days	9%
31 to 60 days	9%
Over 180 days	3%

Paid Time-Off Accrual Schedules

The most common schedule for accruing paid time-off for existing full-time employees is biweekly.

Paid Time-Off Accrual Eligibility Schedules for Existing Full-Time Employees
Accrual occurs bi-weekly	48%
Accrual occurs monthly	22%
All days are accrued immediately at start of year	16%
Accrual occurs daily	8%
Other	4%

Number of Paid Time-Off Days

The table below shows the number of days provided by paid time-off model, type of time-off and tenure.

Number of Days by Paid Time-Off Model, Type of Time-Off, and Tenure
	25th Percentile	50th Percentile	75th Percentile
*Traditional Model with* specified number of sick & personal days**
Designated Holidays	8	9	10
Floating Holidays	0	1	2
Sick & Personal Days	5	6	10
Vacation Days
1 Year of employment	10	10	15
5 Years of employment	15	15	18
10 Years of employment	15	20	20
15 Years of employment	20	20	21
20 Years of employment	20	20	25
*Traditional Model withoutspecified number of sick & personal days*
Designated Holidays	8	9	10
Floating Holidays	0	1	2
Sick & Personal Days	*	*	*
Vacation Days
1 Year of employment	15	15	20
5 Years of employment	15	20	20
10 Years of employment	20	20	20
15 Years of employment	20	20	25
20 Years of employment	20	23	25
PTO Bank Model
Designated Holidays	8	9	10
Pool of Unspecified Days
1 Year of employment	15	15	19
5 Years of employment	20	20	24
10 Years of employment	21	25	27
15 Years of employment	23	25	28
20 Years of employment	24	25	30
* Some traditional models allow an unspecified number of sick & personal days.

W. Leigh Culpepper, CCP, GRP, CBP, is president and CEO of Culpepper and Associates Inc., which conducts worldwide salary surveys and provides benchmark data for compensation and employee benefit programs. Jeremy Greenup, CCP, is a research analyst at the firm.

Reposted with permission

Source: Culpepper Benefits Surveys, June 2008, www.culpepper.com.

Data source:

Culpepper Benefits Survey of 279 organizations, March-May 2008.

Breakdown by industry sector:

Technology:Software 30%; IT services 11%; telecom/Internet services 7%; hardware & electronics 6%; aerospace & defense 3%; eBusiness 3%; semiconductor 3%; other technology 4%.

Life sciences: Biotechnology 4%; medical devices/equipment 6%, pharmaceutical 2%; research services 2%; other life sciences 1%.

Other industry sectors: 15%.

Breakdown by number of employees:

Up to 100: 37%; 101 to 1000: 43%; Over 1,000: 20%.

Breakdown by corporate status:

Public 65%; private 31%; not-for-profit 3%; government 1%.

Breakdown by country:

United States 83%; Canada 4%; Australia 3%; Taiwan 3%; United Kingdom 3%; Other 4%.