My New Boss Told Me Not To Take All My Pto Each Year

This post was written by Alison Green and published on Ask a Manager.

A reader writes:

I recently landed a job offer at a large global company after taking a year off. The job search was a tough one, but after some bumps in the road I was pretty excited about this company and accepted their offer. I ended up negotiating for additional vacation time (four weeks) to match my last role, which they granted.

I really liked the people and company culture throughout the interview process. The only minor critique would be that the process took much longer than expected on their side (an additional two months) due to vacations and holidays. I took it to be a good sign that their employees actually disconnected while out. I have a big family vacation that I’ve had planned for about a year coming up a few months after I start, and I notified them of this when I accepted the offer.

I start in about two weeks, and my future boss called me for what I thought would be a “welcome to the team” call. While she was pleasant and welcoming, she spent the majority of the call expressing surprise over this time-off notification from me, and told me that while my vacation was approved, I “shouldn’t expect to use all of my vacation time” each year. She shared her own story how she lost allotted days this past year, and since they don’t roll over or pay them out, she called it “giving them back to the company.”

I am pretty deflated, and my excitement has been dampened. I absolutely planned to take all of my vacation, as I negotiated for this in lieu of negotiating salary. I completely understand not taking PTO at crunch times, but as she explained it the area is understaffed and it’s always very fast-paced and busy.

This is my first job after a very toxic workplace and while I’ve worked hard on healing, I’m terrified to walk into another. How big of a red flag is this and is there any recourse I can take to ensure I’m able to take my negotiated PTO?

It’s a big red flag.

She’s openly telling you that they don’t plan to give you the thing they promised you they would give you — the thing you negotiated instead of additional salary, and part of the reason you accepted the job.

And the idea that you shouldn’t use all your vacation time each year — leave that’s part of your compensation and doesn’t roll over to the next year — because you should instead “give back to the company” is offensive and ridiculous. It’s not that different than saying you’re expected to donate some of your salary back to the company, or to go without pricey medications so the company’s health insurance costs don’t go up.

Your vacation leave is part of your compensation. You negotiated that compensation, and they agreed to it.

I’m curious whether you negotiated that increase with the manager herself or with someone else, like HR. Either way, it might make sense to go back to HR now and say you’re receiving mixed signals about the compensation you thought had been agreed on, explain what the manager said, and ask them to clarify.

Alternately, you could go back to the manager and say something similar. For example: “I was concerned when we last spoke that you said you didn’t expect me to use the full amount of vacation leave the company agreed to when I accepted the job. I specifically negotiated additional leave in lieu of negotiating salary and took the company at its word when it agreed to X weeks, so I hoped we could clear that up and get on the same page before I start.”

Probably the best option of them all: say it to both HR and the manager in an email to both, so that she’s not going around them with her own, unsanctioned messaging.

Even after this, it’s possible that you could start this job and everything will be fine — that you can be assertive about taking the time you negotiated and that it won’t sour your relationship with your new manager in a significant way. Some red flags spell certain or near-certain doom, but I don’t think this one is as clear-cut if you’re assertive about what you negotiated.

But it’s also possible that she will hold it against you and/or will pressure you about vacation time in ways that significantly alter the conditions you thought you were accepting when you took the job. You won’t know until you start, and maybe not until after a few months go by.

But follow up on that conversation now and make it clear that you took the company at its word and need them to adhere to it. That gives you the best chance of holding on to what they agreed to.