I am employed in Ky. When I was Hired 10 years ago I was given a benefits package.

After two of our employees reached the 4 week vacation mark, the new Manger decided he would changed all of our benefits which included a cut in vacation time; a cut in sick time; cut in amount employer paid toward retirement; cut in paid personal time; and a huge cut in the amount the employer paid toward health insurance.

I heard of a case where a large manufactor did the same thing and had to pay all its employees for the vacation, they did not get and even had to reinstate the vacation time they were hired by.

1. What is the law on changing benefits after they have been earned.
Vacation? Sick Time? retirement? health insurance?

None of the benefits you mention are required by law. In some, but not all or even most, states, vacation time (not sick time, not holidays, not personal days, just vacation or PTO) that has already been accrued is considered wages so that time already accrued cannot be lost. To the best of my knowledge, KY is not one of those states but check with the state DOL to be certain. Please note that even in these states, nothing in the law prohibits the employer from changing the vacation policy going forward. While I don't know what case you are referring to, I'm willing to bet money that there was either there was a contract involved which guaranteed x amount vacation, the case was in one of the states where vacation is considered wages, or both.

Sick time is not required by any law and in the absence of a binding contract to the contrary, an employer can change, drop, or otherwise amend their sicktime policy at any time and with no notice, including the loss of time already accrued.

No law requires an employer to provide a retirement plan and if they do offer one, no law requires that the employer provide any of the funding to it. As long as they make any relevant changes to the plan document first, they may stop making payments to a retirement plan at any time.

With the sole exception of Hawaii (and not always there), no private employer is required to offer health insurance. If they do offer it, state law dictates what, if any, portion of it is employer paid. They need pay no more than the minimum required by law (in some states, they need not pay any part of it at all). As long as any state-mandated notice is provided, they can make changes at any time.

I work for a manufactoring company in ky and according to the company you must first work the months before you acquire vac. time so let's say a person started in Jan of 2000 they had no vacation days til jan.2001 but according to our employer they say that if for some reason you quit in 2001 and you use the vac. days you acquired in2000 you have to pay them back because to them you didn't earn the days til 2001 they let you borrow them from the following year even though you didn't get to use them and now they are saying that if you go out on a medical leave of absence and you have no vacation days acquired you have to pay the equivalant of one days pay can they do this sounds to me that they are trying to make you save up your days til dec. and if god for bids nothing happensd to you before you go out for shut down you can use your days then??? is this legal

If they advance you leave ahead of when you earn it, then yes, they can recoup the advance if you quit.

They can not charge you to be off work, but they don't have to pay you for that day either. It isn't clear if that is what you mean or if they are literally sendingyou a bill.

I guess my question is since I have no vac days because they have already taken 30 hours of my days away from me for being on mloa and trust me they do not pay you when you don't work you have to draw short term disability, and so since they are not paying me while I am off and they already took my vac days away from me, they say I haven't even earned yet, why are they allowed to take my pay since I have no more vac. time and they aren't paying while I am off either?????

They don't have to pay you when you don't work. Period.

ok thank you I understand they do not have to pay me for working and believe me they do not pay us when we don't work but my question was when you go out on a medical leave of absence for a major surgery and you have no vacation days left does the company have the right to take your pay away to the equivalent of what your vacation hours or day would have been??? trust me I know they don't pay you when you don't work but they say since your not at work and you have no more vacation days left they can take money out of your pocket?? My company started a new policy this year they decided to cut back on all the 3 day loa's that we have that every time your out of work for any reason they will take away one vacation day, and then they said if you use up all your vacation days and say something unexpected happens and your out of work for any amount of time for that month you loose a vacation day but since you have no more days for them to take they are going to deduct the money from your pay check when you come back to work and start working I was wondering in the state of ky is this legal?????

They do not have to pay you while you are on medical leave, regardless of your vacation status. However, once you return to work, you have to be paid for all the time you actually work.

what I am trying to find out is can your employer take money away from you if you do not have the vacation days to give them when you go out on a medical leave of absence? My employer takes your vac. time but also upon returning to work if you stayed out to long they will take your hours of vacation or the money equivalent to the hours. lets say you go out for food poisioning for three days and you used your last vacation day before you went out when you come back to work your employer tells you that because you were gone from work for three days and you had no more vacation days left they are going to upon your first check from being at work take that day out of your pay to the equivent of the vacation day so yeah! it's like they give you a bill

How many times do you need me to say it?

You MUST be paid for all the time you actually worked. That means that if you work 8 hours, you have to be paid for 8 hours. They cannot deduct 4 hours because you took four hours too much vacation time and only pay you 4 hours when you worked 8. If you worked 8, you get paid for 8.

However, they do not have to pay you for ANY time that you do not work. That means if you don't work an entire day, you don't get ANY pay for that day.

Now, are we entirely clear?

FIRST of all I am not even asking about pay why you seem to think it is about the money is beyond me it is about vacation time and whether they have the right to take it away, who cares about the money we all know you don't work you get no money, we are salaried employees and the longer you've been with the company the more days you get, they have a new policy that says you get your vacation days at the begining of the year if for some reason you go out on an loa or an mloa they have the right to take one vacation day from you for the day that your out, if for some reason you have no more vacation days left they will then in turn take out the equivalent of one day's pay from your paycheck when you return to work, again this is not about the money but the question is can they take our vacation days away from us because we are sick or because of a medical problem, we thought vacation days were for when you wanted to use them for pleasure . And please we ask that if you do respond please don't be rude about it.

They do have that right. Happy now? :rolleyes:

You should have stopped when you were ahead.

They have the right to deduct a vacation day for ANY time you do not work, regardless of the reason.