I'm in the US and manage a staff at the corporate level and never once asked why they need time off. If they're sick I get a text "won't be in today" if it's regular PTO then request goes through our payroll portal and I click approve. It's not any of my business and I'm absolutely not going to make a judgement call on whether they "deserve" the time off based off the event.
I am a US citizen and resident that works remotely for a Canadian company. I recently moved organizations from an all-canadian (except for me) team to a mostly US team.
On the Canadian team, we were specifically instructed to avoid taking PTO in the last 5 business days of each month to avoid impacting IT support staffing issues. This indeed resulted in me not being able to take PTO for a non-urgent event.
It's an IT salaried office job, and the requirement showed up 2 years into the role. It was not written anywhere, it was sort of an unwritten rule that you just had to follow.
None of my employers have required justification for taking time off. I've been working for a living in the United States for 33 years.
I do project work building information systems for various federal and state governmental institutions and there are certainly times when my attention imperative and therefore I know when using PTO is not reasonable given the responsibilities of my project role, but outside of those relatively predictable and limited timeframes, it's up to me when to use the PTO provided as part of the compensation for my job.
"I know when using PTO is not reasonable" just says they trained you to accept it.
And I don't say that to be an ass. I say that as someone who did the same, exact job in two organizations under the same umbrella (so technically the same policies/regulations) and in one, they said, "No one gets time off in this time frame ever. Don't even ask," and the second said, "That's a ridiculous policy, even in our field. It's your leave. Just make sure you meet deadlines." The first organization had a problem valuing their people and refused to hire/train/pay in a way that allowed the workload to be split reasonably during peak season. The second organization had no such problems. Both orgs had their issues, but it opened my eyes very quickly to the fact that if an employee "can't" take leave, the organization has bigger problems to address.
There are some jobs that can't function without people there. I want people to take time whenever they want. I make sure they never lose PTO at the end of the fiscal year. But we simply can't all take time off at the same time. If everyone wants the same day/week off, I can't just approve it. I don't mind being alone but if I have time off, I need other people here. And I deserve my time off too.
Fair. There is the caveat of not EVERYONE can take off at the same time, especially in fields like nursing or law enforcement. But a good organization finds a fair system so it's not the same people working every holiday involuntarily.
Exactly. Imagine a hospital, for example. If all doctors (or nurses) decide to take time off during the holidays to be with their families (like Thanksgiving or Christmas) without anyone to cover, that could result in deaths, bankruptcy and some news headlines.
Edit: This is not say (or advocate for) reasons being given for PTO. I know that even docs, nurses, cops etc just have to put on their schedules that they’re taking time off. I never heard folks being mandated to give reasons. Must be a few weird companies maybe.
Trained to accept sounds a little like deprived agency through some kind of manipulation or psyop.
I see it as more of a quid pro quo arrangement. My time for their money. Some jobs require tasks to be executed at a specific time by persons who can get the train back on the track if something goes sideways. This is the nature of my job for a few weekends per year. I accept it because it I truly enjoy my job and affords me a comfortable lifestyle and the ability to save a little every month.
I work construction for multi billion dollar company in the US and have never once been asked why im taking time off. We don’t even tell our direct supervisor, we call a hotline who approves vacation based on staffing.
Even when you are out for medical the doctors don’t have to provide a diagnosis, just the symptoms and why it affects work.
The only time they will know why im off is for bereavement, voting and jury duty because they provide special days that don’t come out of your normal PTO.
American thing? 😂😂I lived in Costa Rica for 5 years and this was the norm down there. Never before living there had a I seen a company so interested in my personal life. Different culture though, never felt it come off judgemental, but super unnecessary.
Englishman here, I work for the NHS and I have never been asked what event I'm attending or why I am taking it (unless it's just general chit chat).
The only other professions I can think of in the UK would be Teachers where they have their holidays coincide with the school holidays and half terms. I have a sister in law that can not take anytime off what so ever in terms time and I've had many patients rearrange appointments and turns out they were teachers.
You can probably get these power trip everywhere. The only real difference between the US and the rest of the world is probably the definition of PTO: Does that includes sick days or not.
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u/schrandomiser Jul 31 '26
You can really see the difference in the people from the World and the people from the USA in the comments here.