Sounds like a management problem to me

In college, many years back, I worked for a Home Depot that was chronically understaffed. I worked the lumber and building materials department, often during peak hours for contractors coming in to buy things for their projects and often completely by myself. Iʻd also work until like 11 at night and have to be in at dawn the next day. Keep in mind, I was also part-time (it was my senior year of college). I requested time off for Thanksgiving to see my family, something no other retailer I worked for objected to. They denied my request.

So, like Peter Gibbons, I just stopped going. I went home one night and just never came back (other than to sneakily collect my last check a few weeks later). Never answered the phone when they called. I just disappeared.

Years later I bumped into one of my former co-workers (he was working at a car rental place and I was renting a van). He said that he did pretty much the same thing not too longer after lol.

Which I always thought was weird, it's not like there aren't enough people around who don't care about Christmas (and would also jump at the holiday bonus).

This. Businesses running leaner and leaner to comical levels so the C-suite can make more profit. It's not my problem if they're too shortsighted because of the dollar signs -- my vacation time is a necessary component of my employment agreement and my compensation.

Late last year my company switched to "unlimited PTO." Ironically this happened just before I had saved up 120 hours (specifically vacation hours separate from sick days or anything else) to go visit my fiance abroad without question. A couple weeks ago HR sent out a message to the managers that "unlimited" (which includes sick days, bereavement, etc) basically means 25 days at max, but we should "encourage" around 15 days.

When I brought up that "Unlimited PTO" was gonna be real bad news for us, my coworkers didn't really believe it, but now some of them are getting pushback or outright denied on trips they had planned last year. If you are applying for a company that says "unlimited PTO" ask exactly what that means. And if they say "manager's discretion" ask what the HR recommendation or policy is to the manager. It's meant to be a profit-increasing tool to get new recruits to sign on, as well as ensuring that they can cut you off from taking days off when they feel like.

don't quote me

More like: take your time off as soon as possible.. you should always have zero days set aside

It also eliminates the vacation pay-out when someone resigns.

In the Netherlands, I've never had this happen.. Sure, they want you to teken time off at certain period, but if the know you want time off at a cwrtaib period, they should just get staff to meet minimum service levels.

Ah yeah totally forgot about that too, definitely

"Guess you should've planned better, this probably won't reflect well on your next performance review. Anyway, see ya!"

I worked in a destination outdoors chain. My departments I ran at different points were firearms and marine electronics. Both were high-dollar purchases that usually involve 1:1 interactions with workers.

When someone doesn't buy a $4000 sonar unit because nobody was on the floor in that department it hurts.

Managers dont even do the half ass work theyre supposed to anymore for their inflated salaries.

A lot of jobs that even require degrees and licensing are having managers ask people to find their own coverage. The managerial class is the ultimate fucking waste of space.

If you can do this to them, they can do this to you.

So take a sick leave when they do that.

My ex was so happy when they went to unlimited PTO, but she's overworked as it is and nobody does her job when she's not there, on top of her boss just dumping her work down on her. So she has to do extra work on the day before and after, so she just quit taking days off until HR told her she needed to take 4 days off in the next 2 weeks and that just meant 8 days of busting her ass, and she was livid.

That sounds like a whole lotta not my fucking problem.

Ah! Never worked high-stakes retail like that. I get it now.

Fucking yes! Hang in, get the experience they're paying you to steal, run away. It's crazy that people focus on employers fucking us when we can be fucking them!.

Oh no. Anyway.

She should just do less. Sounds like she's a good worker, they won't fire her. Standards are lower than we tend to think