Floating holidays

Scope

Floating holidays apply to employees whose employers recognize holiday pay on a flexible schedule.

Regulatory citations

• None

Key definitions

• None

Summary of requirements

Company designation. An employer might adopt a floating holiday that is designated on particular days chosen by the company. Essentially, this is no different from any other holiday. For instance, many employers observe New Year’s Day, but it may occur on a Thursday.

Therefore, the company might designate January 2nd (Friday) as a floating holiday. In this case, the holiday policy can simply list the “regular” holidays and indicate that the company had adopted a floating holiday to be designated by the company.

For example, the company might list its holidays (New Year’s Day, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Labor Day, and so on) and simply add “Floating Holiday as needed, to be designated at the company’s sole discretion.”

Employee’s choice. At some companies, a floating holiday is provided to employees for their own use as a kind of vacation day, like taking a day off for a birthday. If the floating holiday can be taken at the employee’s discretion, it is essentially a bonus vacation day. The company could include language to this effect in either the vacation policy (if it has one) or the holiday policy – or even in both, to ensure that employees are aware of it. This language should describe the terms of use and other restrictions (e.g., how much notice is required, whether there are restrictions for scheduling, and so on).

In some cases, a floating holiday may be provided to employees after they are scheduled to work on a particular holiday (if the business is open on holidays). In situations where a floating holiday is provided to “replace” a working holiday, the provisions for use should once again be described in the holiday policy. For instance, the company might allow the employee to schedule the floating holiday on a particular day (just like a vacation day) and might even allow the floating holiday to be taken on days which might otherwise be denied a vacation day.

For example, if vacation days are scheduled by seniority, and there are already other employees approved for vacation on a particular day, the company might still allow the floating holiday to “trump” the seniority schedule. The employer would need to determine if the company can work with fewer staff members, or if someone with more seniority would be “bumped” to honor the floating holiday.

Alternatively, the company might reserve the right to designate a specific day off for the employee. In this case, it would be handled similarly to a company-designated floating holiday, as described above.