What do I do about a co-worker beating me out of vacation time?

Stacy B: What do I do about a co-worker beating me out of vacation time?
My husband has the first 2 weeks off in July at his job. I had mentioned to a co-worker that I was hoping to have enough PTO time accrued to be able to take a few days off with my husband at that time. I just found out that she scheduled a two week vacation for herself during the same time I wanted off. I can’t do anything about because she already put in for it before I had a chance to. She even had the nerve to ask me if anyone else was taking time off at that time and when I told her that I was wanting to take a few days off with my husband – she informed me that she had to be off then because her mom had already made plans to be be off work and they were wanting to go to Disney land – even though they had not even made reservations yet! I just feel that she tookl advantage of me. I know that next time I will keep my mouth shut about any possible vacation time I am planning so she doesn’t steal it away from me. But how do I deal with what’s happened now?

Answers and Views:

Answer by majormomma
Simply keeping your mouth shut next time won’t solve the problem. You need to know if there is a vacation policy at your work and what it is. At your next department meeting, ask your supervisor to go over the policy with everyone so it’s clear as to how and when to apply for time off and how that time off is granted. I’m willing to bet there are people who put in for their vacation months ahead of time. Did you think if you waited until a few weeks ahead of time that it would be easy to give you the time off? July and August are prime vacation months and it can get very competitve as who gets priority.

As for now, all you can do is talk to your supervisor and ask if there is anyway you can take some time off, but be prepared to be turned down. Your coworker was a bit underhanded, but she didn’t “steal” your vacation if she followed the vacation policy at your work.

Answer by Still reading
The two weeks you wanted are the most popular weeks for vacation, so there was bound to be competition. I doubt that your co-worker chose those weeks because you wanted them, but because you wanted them, she quickly locked them up.

Most businesses have definite policies about how vacation time is approved and how conflicts between co-workers requests for the same days off are handled. I ran an office with about 200 people for years and found this to be an issue of major contention every year. The policy we finally came up with was to ask employees to submit requests for vacation early in the year. We then went through the requests and were able to automatically grant most of them.

However, the two weeks at the beginning of July and the two weeks at Christmas always had had several bids. And, we had widely varying seniority in the group. What we finally came up with after years of trial and error, was to give the first choice days to the person(s) with the most seniority. Then, before that person got anymore choices, we went through the entire batch of requests and attempted to fill as many as possible. Only after everybody had one request approved did we go back to the highest seniority persons and grant them their second request. I’m sure this system was no more fair than any other, but it seemed to spread the best days off among the largest group of people possible. We also limited people to only one week of the popular first 2 weeks of July and only one week of the Christmas holiday.

Your company policy probably is pretty vague, but your department probably has pretty firm guidelines. So, find out what they are. If they don’t seem fair, speak out and see whether there is room to come up with a better plan. In my office, there certainly was. I really wanted to please as many employees as possible. One guideline which never changed, however, was that once vacation was approved, nobody could bump that person, no matter how much seniority they had and no matter how much accrued vacation they had. So, there is probably no recourse this year. You might ask your co-worker whether she would be willing to give up one of the two weeks involved as it’s the only time you can be off with your husband. Maybe she would take the last week in June and the first week in July, while you’d take the second and third week in July.

Answer by PatV
Have you actually spoken with your supervisor about taking time off during that period? You seemed to have jumped to conclusions about when you should apply for the vacation, how your leave time affects other co-workers and how their vacation affects you.

Get the information straight from the person who controls this situation. Can you do flex time (6am to 2:30 for example) or come in on weekends prior and after that period? Go in with definite answers to the problem rather than expecting your boss to just simply feel sorry for you.

And sit down right now and plan out all your proposed vacation time for the year. Take that with you and get your requests in now.

Answer by CC
One thing that may help immediately is to focus on how miserable your co-worker is going to be in the atrociously long lines at Disneyland. 🙂

If you look at it from your co-worker’s point of view, what would you have had her do–wait until you decided whether or not you were going to take the time off? That doesn’t seem right. Aren’t her plans just as valid as yours? Plus, is it really a plan if it’s just something you’re “hoping” to do.
I understand your disappointment, but to be honest, I think you’re blaming the wrong person.

Why not talk to your supervisor? Maybe there’s a way you can be off for part of that time with your husband. You won’t know until you ask! And if the answer is ‘no’, put a smile on your face and swallow the disappointment. (Hard to do, I know. I once missed out on an all-expenese paid trip to Hawaii due to a similar situation. Ouch!) Focus on how much better prepared you’ll be next time out! And how long those lines at Disneyland really are! 😀

Answer by molly
There is niothing you can do – she beat you to it. Perhaps talk to your supervisor, but I think it will sound whiney. Live and learn.

Answer by love_hurts_first
shut up and be happy u have a job! =D

Answer by summertime
plan further in advance. especially during the summer season. beat her to the punch next time.

you know the old saying…………….you snooze! you loose!