Q: I have 10 PTO days a year, last year I was paid 15 days. They are now taking away 5 days this year. Is this allowed?
The 5 days extra that I was paid was not written or made aware to me that I was being paid or taking from the current years PTO.
A:
To start off, if you were overpaid by mistake, your employer has a right to have the over payment returned to it. You do not have a legal right to keep the money. If you do not pay the money back you can be disciplined and even terminated if the employer wanted to do so. This is true whether or not the employer had the right to modify your PTO accrual this year.
As to that modification, PTO is not a right proscribed by some law. It is a discretionary employee benefit offered or not by an employer. That means the employer is allowed to modify and even eliminate the right to PTO if it so desires. The only real legal limitation to that right is that an employer cannot take away already earned PTO. Once the PTO is earned, it is considered the employee's money to be either used or cashed out upon termination of employment.
Changing how many hours or days of PTO you can earn is within the employer's rights to do. Taking away earned PTO to cover an employee's obligation to the employer is not lawful.
Bottom line is that you are going to have to pay the mistakenly paid money back no matter what.
Good luck to you.
Brad S Kane agrees with this answer
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