I work an alternate work week: 4 days x 10 hours. My personal schedule is 42 hours total.

If I take a vacation day in a week that I worked a holiday, I will recieve the time and a half for working a holiday and I will recieve the 8 hour holiday pay, but I will not recieve any vacation pay because I have worked 32 hours on the job in those 3 days and the 8 hours of holiday benefit make it 40 hours.

My employer says by law they can only pay me 40 hours in that situation.

If I take a sick day or vacation day in a regular week it is similar. I will not be paid for the missed work above the 40 hours. They call it "cashing in vacation or sick time."

Is that some adaption to the OT law?

My employer says by law they can only pay me 40 hours in that situation.

If I take a sick day or vacation day in a regular week it is similar. I will not be paid for the missed work above the 40 hours. They call it "cashing in vacation or sick time."

Is that some adaption to the OT law?

Not true. There is no law that prohibits them from paying over 40 hours in this situation. However, that could very well be their policy, which (unless there is some obtuse exception of which I'm not aware) is not illegal, unless they are actually decrementing your vacation balance without actually paying it.

That's pretty much what I figured. I doubted that they are not allowed by law to pay me.

But if it does mean going into an OT situation (not on the holiday pay) then she could justify saying that legally she can't go over the 40 while holding back the caveat that it is because she would have to pay OT.

But it all seems a bit convoluted. The accusation that employees are just trying to cash in their vacation or sick time is offensive at the least.

Is this referred to as cashing in?

The holiday pay: I can not see any way that it would be illegal for them to pay the 8 hours for the actual holiday, rather than any day in the week. I am sure it is some kind of grandfather left over from when we got the holidays as vacation time to be used when there was an opportunity.

Policy is one thing; fair is another thing; and law is something else. I am interested to see what the devil the finance coordinator is talking about.

"cashing in" when it comes to paid time off usually means that instead of taking the time, you are paid for it. I've never heard the phrase used in this context before.