Can a company legally not pay you for sick pay that you have accrued when you decide to quit?

Question

I have months of sick pay that has accrued over the last ten years and am being told that if I quit ,it is lost

Answer 1

If it is true I would sick before I quit.

Answer 2

It depends what their policy is. Most companies don't pay for accrued sick leave. Some don't even let you roll it to the next year.

i've been at my company for 10 year - and I have been out out four days sick in all that time. I think we get 10 days a year. I'd really make a bundle when I left - but - our policy says if you don't use it within the year, it goes away.

Check with your HR department - if you have one. If you were not informed of what the policy was - and you have something saying that you get X days of sick leave a year - you may have a case.

Answer 3

You accrue annual leave. A business budgets some loss in productivity due to illness. Two very different things.

Accruing sick leave is about acknowledging that you were not a burden to the business due to illness for that period of time. It is expected that you are a productive member of the work community and not a leech. You were obviously productive and your reward for that was your pay.

The accruing means that if something goes wrong in your life the business will acknowledge the time you were not a leech and thus credit you a proportional amount of time to recover off work.

If you choose to take sick leave regularly you actually depress the wages of your work colleagues. Given for each dollar spent the business gets 90cents worth of contribution from it's work force the business income will only be able to support the 90cents productivity. As a result the 90cents available to pay you is spread over the $1 worth of effort. So if no one took sick leave the income freed up for wages would increase. Thus improving wages.

Annual leave is time where you are not expected to be productive. Sick leave is time you ARE expected to be productive but aren't.

Answer 4

I agree that the policy varies from company to company. I use to work for amex and the i never let my sick time accrue because i knew that they would not pay me for it. It was a different story for my vacation time. If I gave them the necessary two week notice then I got to keep my vacation. It would have been the same if I was fired.

Answer 5

If the company pays you for sick leave you do not use (at regular intervals), then they should pay your for accrued sick time. If you loose the sick days at the end of the year, or you are allowed to roll the days over from year to year, they do not have to pay you for them.

Answer 6

Yes, many companies label their Sick Pay, and less often, Vacation Pay as a sort of "Use it or lose it" basis. If this is the case, you should utilize the paid leave BEFORE turning in a resignation.

Answer 7

It's legal but check your employee handbook to determine your particular empoloyer's policy...my employer does not pay out accrued vacation or sick days upon termination regardless of whether it is voluntary or not.

Answer 8

Yup, unfortunately. That can even happen with regular vacation days. That's why you should try to use up all your leave if you intend to quit before you put in your resignation. It's a lousy situation.

Answer 9

It depends on the terms as indicated in your employee manual regarding your question. Read the manual and see if the information is clearly stated. If not, talk to your office administrator.

Answer 10

Of course. You'd best take those sick days before you quit.