Paid Time Off
Vacation, Holiday and Sick Time

Employers often give employees paid time off. This is a general category of leave time that includes vacation, holidays, sick days, etc. Time away from the job, when no work is being performed by the employee, is not work time. Thus, even if this time is considered "work time" for some other purpose (such as pension accruals, seniority, or collective bargaining agreement), it is not time the employer has to count as 'hours worked."

For example, if an employee works 10 hours a day on Monday-Wednesday, takes Thursday off, and works 8 hours on Friday, he has only worked 38 hours that week. By contrast, if he had actually worked 10 hours on Thursday, we would have had 48 hours and been entitled to overtime pay for the 8 hours of work over 40 hours.