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Comment by sneak | Hacker News Reader

The passive-aggressive lie that is "unlimited PTO" is part of the growing toxicity of startup work environments.

To me, the most important part of unlimited PTO isn't the "unlimitedness" but the fact that it's not something I'm having to log in a system. It's that usually I can just take off a Friday or a Monday here and there without any issue as long as I give a bit of notice.

My company just got rid of unlimited PTO for all the reasons people say they hate it - they didn't think people were taking enough PTO for their health, it was used unfairly, etc... Functionally now though, I have to file paperwork with 3 different groups to have someone approve even a single day off so they can make sure I'm not going over the number of days off that I have in accordance with my level and seniority. Thankfully my manager has essentially told us they don't care and we're still on unlimited because they don't want to do the paperwork either.

It's not to say that "unlimited" can't be toxic, but it's easy to forget how onerous other systems can be, which can lead to you taking less time off in the same way. One of my friends is the junior on their team on a fixed PTO system and is being forced to take nearly random days off now in order to have any at all because they didn't get their holiday plans in as early as their more senior team members, so now they're stuck with the dregs. Toxic cultures are gonna be toxic. The framing just changes the mechanism.

> It's that usually I can just take off a Friday or a Monday here and there without any issue as long as I give a bit of notice.

I have fixed number of days but still can essentially do this.

> Functionally now though, I have to file paperwork with 3 different groups to have someone approve even a single day off so they can make sure I'm not going over the number of days off that I have in accordance with my level and seniority.

This sounds odd. Why can't you just have a system that tracks number of days and as long as you have the number of days 1-2 days shouldn't be an issue at all. I don't see how switching from unlimited to limited made this approval business necessary at all.

I'm sure it's possible to have a system where this is easy, but giving HR more things to track to prove their value to the company does tend to make no incentive for them to make it trivial. I'm sure systems exist for that that we could buy, but we didn't, so we don't, so someone's got some ad-hoc something in some Oracle DB somewhere, and now taking vacation is an added hassle for my already overworked manager.

Then really it's a failure of management at your company, not the limited vacation system.

Sure, but so is letting "unlimited" just turn into looting by the privileged or some sort of toxic "my manager won't let me take more than a week off". Which is what I've been getting at. People love to condemn Unlimited PTO as some sort of toxic trap, and it certainly can be, but it all comes down to if your HR department is competent and cares. If your management is bad, having fixed PTO isn't going to save you from them.

That's just because it's more common the case that employees get screwed by the company than other way round. One easy way to make unlimited really unlimited is by having a reasonable number of mandatory days off like 4 weeks. Then I'll believe unlimited PTO.

I'm not asking you to "believe" in anything. There are just some companies where you can take 4-6 weeks off and some companies where you can't, and which one you're in depends on which team you work on and who your manager and HR rep is more than what they claim their PTO plan is.

I hypothetically have almost 5 weeks of days off at my current job and between not having much vacation options because of pandemic and not wanting to just be lazy at home, I haven't used most of it. Should someone from HR just tell me I'm not allowed to work in December now?

Yes, but HR is sadly considered a cost centre, so that failure of management is sadly quite common.

Why don’t they call it something else then? Maybe “Flexible PTO”? I really don’t like the “unlimited” part of the name. It feels confusing / misleading to me.

Probably because "unlimited" is the relevant part to the part of the company that cares - HR. If it was limited, it would need to be tracked. I get the objection to the fact that you can't literally take 200 days off or whatever, but that just feels like pedantry when at this point the colloquial meaning of "unlimited pto" is fairly clear.

That's actually a good point. Maybe it should really be called "take-what-you-need untracked PTO." That conveys the point that nobody in HR is going to keep track of how many days you take off, and that you're actually supposed to take those days. It's too awkward to spin well on the company's jobs page, though.

The colloquial meaning doesn't seem clear at all. Am I OK taking 2 weeks? 3 weeks? 4 weeks? 5 weeks? 6 weeks? 7 weeks? 10 weeks? Which is it, precisely? At what precise number of days does it go from being "a reasonable amount" to "lol are you nuts?"

I mean, the answer there is "it varies" and "it depends". Probably something around 3-5 weeks. If you need a precise number to feel ok about the situation, the colloquial meaning is going to be enough to tell you you shouldn't work there. I get what you're asking for, but you're essentially just complaining that it's not Static Days PTO, which is a fine opinion to have, but going "I don't think X is clear because it's not Y instead" isn't really a thing.

You can dislike what is meant by "Unlimited PTO" and the fact that it's not clear on how many days you can take off, but that doesn't mean it's unclear what Unlimited PTO entails.

In reality, the only person who has unlimited PTO is usually the CEO, because he's the only one who can afford to get away repeatedly.

Depends on the company!

If it's inauthentic though, employees can smell it from far away.

I have no doubt it's meant in good faith at many companies, but it's almost sure to be used unfairly. A lot of people, especially folks who don't feel safely part of whatever in-group, are going to be hesitant to push that policy, especially because being on vacation can be an imposition on your coworkers.

I suspect you could implement the same policy in practice with less social anxiety by mandating N weeks of vacation and allowing additional time off upon request.

Truth is it could be hard to take vacation in a toxic company irrespective of whether it's clearly laid out or not. A lot of startups are toxic - intentionally or unintentionally.

Mandating vacation is a good idea when they really mean it. Use it or lose might work. Fixed days with payout if you quit or an option to cash out works too - companies carry it in their balance sheet and encourage days off as a result.

In my experience limited PTO leads to burnout more often because employees could get paid more by taking fewer days off since their PTO is paid out when they leave. So some employees choose to continue working because they feel bad taking time off that technically decreases their potential pay.

It's always inauthentic, as otherwise people would take all work days off, never show up again, and collect a paycheck in perpetuity.

This is a business transaction. "Unlimited PTO" literally means free paychecks.

Sure, that's a literal definition of unlimited.

In reality, I've seen it implemented as a "take what you need" policy. Unlimited in that sense means there is no upper bound. Managers are trained to push people who are trending under 5 weeks per year to take more time off. Some people take a lot more than that. Work still get done and people seem happy to do the work. Sample size = 1 employer. Inauthentic?

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