The company I work for gives 20 days annual leave a year to all 正社員 employees. The first year I was in my company I only took 10 days so that I could carry 10 days over (as a buffer in case of sickness), so I had 30 days the following year.
Since then I have taken the full 20 days every year, and carried over 10 days every year. This means I take 4 one week holidays a year and have a good work life balance – this is even encouraged by HR.
However, because hardly any of my Japanese colleagues ever use their paid leave – always wanting to keep some put by just in case – my company is introducing a new system whereby 10 days of annual leave has become sick leave, and 10 days paid leave. This was supposed to encourage people to take the full 10 days off knowing that they have 10 days sick leave just in case..
But for me, this means my annual leave is effectively been halved! If I want to go back home to my country for two weeks, I have no more holidays that year..
If other people don't want to take their annual leave then fine.. but I don't understand why this means I should be penalised when I have planned my leave to always have a buffer in case of illness and create a work life balance.
Are companies legally allowed to change existing contracts like this? If all existing 正社員 employees already have 20 days of annual leave to use as they like, can Japanese companies dictate that 10 has to be sick leave.. just like that?
by Krkboy