Termination Pay
When employment ends with the District, you are entitled to receive certain types of payment for accrued leave balances.
Upon separation from service, The School District of Philadelphia compensates employees for their unused personal leave, personal illness and vacation days that remain in an employee’s leave bank. The value of the compensation is determined by either management directive (for non-represented employees) or by collective bargaining agreements (for represented employees). Please follow the links below to the employee handbook to determine which rules apply. Employees terminating serve under the age of 55 will be compensated via a live check. Employees who have reached, or will reach 55 years of age in the year of termination, will be compensated via contribution to a 403b/457b tax sheltered annuity plan.
See the TSA No Paperwork letter for an up-to-date 403b/457b provider list.
What Happens to my Leave Accrual, when my Employment at the District Terminates?
Leave Adjustments for Termination Pay
Sabbaticals:
Employees approved for sabbatical leave are required to return to service at the School District of Philadelphia at the expiration of their sabbatical leave, and to remain in service for a period of at least equal to the period of leave. Employees who do not fulfill this requirement are not entitled to termination pay.
For example: If an employee is granted a six month sabbatical from September 1 through January 31 and terminates service on February 1, they are ineligible for termination pay.
If an employee is granted a six month sabbatical from September 1 through January 31 and returns to service February 1 through June 30, they are entitled to receive termination pay.
Proration:
Final year leave entitlements for personal leave, personal illness and vacation days are proportionately reduced based on date of termination. Personal illness and personal leave days are granted September 1.
For example: If 10 month employee terminates before June 30, personal illness and personal leave will be prorated based on the date of termination. If a 12 month employee terminates before August 31, personal illness and personal leave will be prorated based on the date of termination. The employees in these examples will not be entitled to the full year’s worth of leave days.
Over-usage of leave days:
If an employee terminates employment before the end of the school year (June 30 for 10 month employees and August 31 for 12 month employees) and has exhausted all available current leave days, an adjustment will be applied to any available leave.
For example: In September an employee is credited with 3 personal leave days and 10 personal illness days. The employee terminates service on March 15. The employee has exhausted both their current year’s personal leave and their current year’s personal illness days, but has 14 days of frozen personal leave days. During the term pay process, Payroll will deduct the over usage of personal leave and personal illness days from the available frozen personal leave balance.
Coded unpaid leave days (5 or more consecutively)
Employees leave days, (personal illness and personal leave) are prorated for every 5 or more consecutive days of unpaid coded leave (unpaid coded leave consists of F60, F61, F63, F77 and F99).
Wage continuation:
Following a wage continuation (Health insurance) absence of six months or more, an employee’s vacation allotment will be reduced by an amount equal to the employee’s normal vacation allotment for each month of absence (11 or more days count as a month).
Personal leave will be reduced for every 22 days of wage continuation used during the employees tenure with the school district. For 12 month employees 0.25 personal leave days will be deducted for every 22 days used, for 10 month employees, 0.3 personal leave days will be deducted for every 22 days used.
Example 1: If a 10 month employee is out on wage continuation 0.3 will be deducted for every 22 days of absence. For this example said employee used 328 days of wage continuation during their tenure with the School District. We calculate 328/22 = 14 * .30 = 4.2 personal leave days deducted.
Active employees who previously terminated service but did not receive termination pay will have a personal leave and vacation leave (if applicable) deduction for wage continuation usage during their previous termination period.
Example 2: If an active employee used 244 days of wage continuation before terminating in 2009, never received termination pay and returned to work in 2011, personal leave will be deducted for the period worked up to the 2009 termination date. If those 244 days occurred over a consecutive six months or more, the employee’s vacation balance will be reduced accordingly.
For additional information on wage continuation requirements please contact our Health Services department at 215-400-4660.
Worker’s compensation:
Following a worker’s compensation absence of six months or more, an employee’s vacation allotment will be reduced by an amount equal to the employee’s normal vacation allotment for each month of absence (11 or more days count as a month).
Example 3: If a twelve month employee is out on worker’s compensation for 6 months or more (from May through December, eight months) they would lose vacation accrual for that period of absence. For this example said employee accruals 1.25 days of vacation monthly. We calculate 1.25 * 8 = 10 days of vacation deducted.
Active employees who previously terminated service but did not receive termination pay will have a vacation leave deduction for wage continuation usage during their previous termination period.
Example 4: If an active 12 month employee used 9 months of worker’s compensation before terminating in 2009, never received termination pay and returned to work in 2011, vacation leave will be deducted for that occurrence of 6 months or more of worker’s compensation usage during the period worked up to the 2009 termination date.
For additional information on worker’s compensation requirements please contact our Worker’s Compensation department at 215-400-4590.