Leave types and policies

A leave type is the name — Casual, Sick, Earned. A policy is the set of rules applied to those types for a group of people.

That separation is what lets factory staff and head office share the name 'Casual leave' while getting different numbers of days, without inventing two leave types that mean the same thing.

• All at once each year — the full entitlement on a fixed date.
• Every month — an equal share credited monthly.
• Earned per completed month — accrued only after each month is worked, which is the usual treatment for earned leave.
• Unlimited — tracked but never exhausted.
• Not allocated — for types like comp off that are granted case by case.

New joiners can be prorated from their joining date so that someone who starts in September does not receive a full year's entitlement.

Unused days can lapse, carry into the next year up to a cap, or be encashed. Carried days can be given an expiry so they do not accumulate indefinitely.

A type can require a minimum length of service, exclude people on probation or serving notice, cap the number of requests per year, or apply only to one gender where the leave type genuinely requires it — maternity leave, for example.

When a request is refused on eligibility grounds the employee is told which rule applied, rather than getting a generic refusal.