Bells and Whistles Employers who don't increase the number of vacation days frequently augment their benefits with other time-off features. Paid or unpaid sabbaticals are an increasingly popular option borrowed from academia, experts say. But putting in enough time to merit a sabbatical when turnover rates are high raises the question of how long it should take to earn one, Hammond said. Ill. PTOs allow employees to wrap their personal, vacation, and sick days into one bank. Workers like it because they often end up with more vacation days, and employers use it to control planned absences, Panszczyk said.
Most people see it as all vacation.
A recent CCH study found that 27 percent of some 300 companies implemented a PTO program in 1999, up from 25 percent in 1998. Companies should study their local markets and benchmark themselves against their rivals to determine how much and what kind of time off to offer new recruits, Panszczyk said. She said she hasn't seen the reverse occur, where employers scale back vacation days during a loose job market. And now isn't the time for a move in that direction. If an employer is having trouble competing, it may reconsider its policies and increase the number of days.