How Can We Encourage Timely Returns from Annual Leave in Our Interior Design Firm?

According to UAE labor law, employees are entitled to 30 days of paid annual leave if their service exceeds one year. Our company is an interior design firm, and 85% of our workforce consists of blue-collar employees. The issue I face is that when these employees go on their annual vacation, very few adhere to the authorized leave duration as agreed upon in the leave form. Instead, everyone takes their own time to return. I am seeking advice on how to address this situation - would rewarding employees for coming back on time or penalizing them for being late be a viable solution? Your insights and guidance would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

I believe it has to be a combination of both choices—reward and penalty. Either one alone usually leads to other consequences or situations, opening the scope for fresh problems while trying to solve one. Moreover, not all rewards or penalties need to be necessarily financial.

Regards,
TS

As Mr. TS advised, we can implement both a reward and penalty approach. For example, we may organize a welcome gathering function within their own department shortly after their vacation. The date of this function should be scheduled and announced to the employee when their leave is approved. This function can serve as an incentive for them to plan their return.

Function Planning and Recognition

One idea is to plan the function on the 35th or 36th day and present a small memento in recognition of their one-year completion. This is my suggestion, and I welcome input from experts to enhance this approach.

Thanks,

Pons

I was working for a large construction company in Oman with around 20,000 expatriates on the payroll, and I was the Manager of Expatriate Affairs. We used to book round-trip tickets for employees in the worker category. If a worker-category employee did not return as per the leave schedule, we immediately sent a letter to the address on record, placed it in the personal file, canceled the return ticket, and closed the employee's file. This process worked well. Employees at least used to communicate in case they needed to postpone their travel. 

No need to go for a rewarding process. You should make a policy like if any employee has any LOPs (Loss Of Pay), their increment for the next year would be decreased by 5% from the actual increment. It's better to implement LOPs if any employee does not report in time. This approach is helpful for the employer as it allows for the reduction of costs from monthly salaries and creates awareness of the effects of LOPs.

Thank you.

Leave and Vacation Policy Preparation

Prepare a Leaves and Vacation Policy for your company. The employee who fails to return to work on the scheduled date after vacation shall be considered absent without permission. Employees should notify their Manager and HR in writing (by email/fax) with the reason for the delay and their expected date of return.

Upon the employee's return to work, if the company does not accept their reason for the late return or if they failed to notify their Manager and HR of the delay, the absence days will be treated as absence without permission. The employee will be subject to the provisions of the company’s Violation and Penalties Schedule.

Regards