Vacation/Sick Leave

Companies tend to consider sick leave as additional days of vacation and consequently combine the two into “paid personal leave.” While the standard number of vacation days is still 2 weeks (10 days or 80 hours), paid leave can extend your vacation time another week or so, assuming you rarely get sick. Anything less than 2 weeks of vacation and a week or so of sick leave should be viewed with suspicion.

Ask upfront how much vacation/leave you’ll receive, if the unused portion can be converted to cash, and how you accrue the time off. Some companies, for instance, won’t let employees take days off until after they pass their 3-month anniversary.

If you want to put a dollar value on this time off, it’s easy to do. Divide your annual salary by 52 (for 52 weeks in a year) and multiply that number by the number of weeks you’ve been offered.