I've done this before after accumulating several years worth of leave due to a previous employer having strange ideas about project management and the mythical man-month.

I suppose I was kind of pressured into it, but I also liked having a pseudo-bonus that year.

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[–] absGeekNZ 3 points 4 months ago (1 children)

There is a minor advantage to the worker, if they accrued the AL at one pay rate and didn't use it. Then the use/cash it in at a later date after a pay increase, the accrued AL is payed out at the higher rate.

This isn't much of an advantage, unless you have had a major correction to your pay rate in the intervening period (like 20-30% increase). For a "normalish" pay rise of 5% the increase is small.

e.g. AL = 0.08 * rate, after a pay rise it is 0.08 * (rate * 1.05) or 0.084 * oldRate (for old accumulated leave).

A side note, it would be better for businesses if AL was accumulated in $ rather than hours. It is better for workers if it is accumulated in hours rather than $. To be fair thought, if it was in $ there would have to be adjustments for time value of money, it would be way more complicated and almost impossible to audit correctly.

[–] Dave 3 points 4 months ago

It's probably a good thing that employers are incentivised to make employees take their leave. Imagine if it was in $ and the longer your employer avoided letting you take leave, the more the value eroded due to inflation...