My work allows you to roll over the 2x the amount you accrue in a year at the end of the fiscal year(June 30). We start off with 15 days(112.5 hours-standard full time is 7.5/day or 37.5/wk) a year and gain 1 per year of service up to 22 days. Since I've been there 4 years, I'm at 19 days a year and am getting to the point where I'm starting to accrue a pretty large amount of time.
My work is heavily tied to the academic year, so our "prime time" for vacation is when class isn't in session. I'll be taking the entire week before Christmas off, for example.
With that said, at 19 days per year, I'm starting to reach the point where I'm accumulating a significant amount of time. Even though I feel like I've taken a decent amount off this year, I still have over 2 weeks "in the bank." I have two weeks scheduled off next year plus some other miscellaneous ones, so I may clean things out decently well.
If I got to the point where I was at risk of losing it, though, I'd make sure I took time off to at least get down to where I wouldn't lose any. Vacation time is part of your total compensation, and losing it is throwing that away.
At the same time, I also like to keep some in reserve. We get 12 days a year of sick time(separate from vacation) that rolls over indefinitely and since I rarely take sick days, I have about a month in reserve. I would have more if I hadn't given two weeks to a coworker with cancer a year or so back(my work does allow/encourage that). I'd hate to THINK that I would need to use that much, but it's nice to have a cushion of both sick and vacation if you need it.
One other thing-if you leave(not retire) my work pays out any accrued vacation time, so if I were to do that it's nice to basically get at least part of a check to tide you over until your new job gets things going. On retirement, they pay both sick and vacation, and I know may people will elect to continue receiving their regular paycheck on this and even delay starting retirement(or at least social security) for a month or two.
My work is heavily tied to the academic year, so our "prime time" for vacation is when class isn't in session. I'll be taking the entire week before Christmas off, for example.
With that said, at 19 days per year, I'm starting to reach the point where I'm accumulating a significant amount of time. Even though I feel like I've taken a decent amount off this year, I still have over 2 weeks "in the bank." I have two weeks scheduled off next year plus some other miscellaneous ones, so I may clean things out decently well.
If I got to the point where I was at risk of losing it, though, I'd make sure I took time off to at least get down to where I wouldn't lose any. Vacation time is part of your total compensation, and losing it is throwing that away.
At the same time, I also like to keep some in reserve. We get 12 days a year of sick time(separate from vacation) that rolls over indefinitely and since I rarely take sick days, I have about a month in reserve. I would have more if I hadn't given two weeks to a coworker with cancer a year or so back(my work does allow/encourage that). I'd hate to THINK that I would need to use that much, but it's nice to have a cushion of both sick and vacation if you need it.
One other thing-if you leave(not retire) my work pays out any accrued vacation time, so if I were to do that it's nice to basically get at least part of a check to tide you over until your new job gets things going. On retirement, they pay both sick and vacation, and I know may people will elect to continue receiving their regular paycheck on this and even delay starting retirement(or at least social security) for a month or two.
