Spotlight

Important news for leave eligible employees!

As a result of an Executive Order signed by President Trump on December 18, 2018, Gov. Ricketts has announced that Nebraska state government agencies will be closed on Monday, December 24, 2018. State law provides that whenever the President gives federal employees paid time off, the State of Nebraska shall grant the same benefit to state employees.

The majority of University of Nebraska Lincoln employees will not be working on December 24, 2018, because of the annual holiday closedown. Holiday eligible UNL employees were already scheduled to use floating holidays, vacation and/or unpaid leave to cover the closedown.

Entries to correct employees’ records, per the instructions below, can be made in January 2019, if not completed before the holiday closedown. We will run reports the first week in January to see what corrections still need made.

Employees who are not eligible for holiday pay, including temporary, on-call and student employees do not receive administrative leave for December 24th.

*For monthly paid employees – 12-month faculty and staff

Monthly paid employees eligible for holiday leave, should be paid regular salary for one of the closedown days. This gives the employee the option to retain a floating holiday, vacation day or cover a day of unpaid leave. Therefore 4 days over the break should be entered with leave and one day will be considered administrative with nothing needed to be entered for that day. If you have submitted 5 days over the break, please delete leave from one of the days denoted with an asterisk below. If you have not yet submitted your leave please do so right away.
Dec. 24 *Floating Holiday/Vacation/Unpaid Leave
Dec. 25 Holiday (Not entered for monthly paid employees)
Dec. 26 * Floating Holiday/Vacation/Unpaid Leave
Dec. 27 * Floating Holiday/Vacation/Unpaid Leave
Dec. 28 * Floating Holiday/Vacation/Unpaid Leave
Dec. 31 * Floating Holiday/Vacation/Unpaid Leave
Jan. 1 Holiday (Not entered for monthly paid employees)

*For biweekly employees and their supervisors

Biweekly paid employees eligible for holiday leave, should use administrative leave on December 24th. The employee has the option to use floating holiday, vacation, or unpaid leave for the rest of the break except actual holidays.

Dec. 24 Admin Leave in ESS time
Dec. 25 Holiday
Dec. 26 Vacation in ESS leave Or Floating Holiday/Unpaid Leave in ESS Time
Dec. 27 Vacation in ESS leave Or Floating Holiday/Unpaid Leave in ESS Time
Dec. 28 Vacation in ESS leave Or Floating Holiday/Unpaid Leave in ESS Time
Dec. 31 Vacation in ESS leave Or Floating Holiday/Unpaid Leave in ESS Time
Jan. 1 Holiday

When choosing between using a floating holiday versus vacation leave, the following should be considered:
• Floating holiday maximum accrual is 32 hours per year. If an employee uses vacation, which would retain a floating holiday, the employee will start 2019 with 8 hours of floating holiday. The employee will need to be aware of the four floating holiday accrual dates and use the retained floating holiday to avoid hitting the maximum which would stop the accrual.
• Vacation maximum accrual is 280 hours, therefore, employees who are close to the maximum may choose to use vacation to avoid hitting the maximum which would stop the accrual. This would retain the floating holiday as mentioned above.
Please contact Carrie Brownyard (472-8674), Sarah Goodrich (254-716-8252), or Tammie Herrington (472-2390), if you have questions.