UC is furthering its support of employees’ work-life balance and is implementing an expansion of paid sick leave to certain employee populations who were previously ineligible for paid sick leave, effective Jan. 1, 2025. 

The impacted employee populations include: 

• Staff with appointments at less than 50% 
• Per diem staff employees 
• Non-Faculty Academics with appointment percentages at less than 50% 

Eligibility 

• Per diem employees will receive 8 sick leave hours per calendar year as a bank; up to 16 hours carries over year to year. The bank will be available shortly after implementation for current per diem employees after their hire date. 
• Staff with appointments at less than 50% will begin accruing sick leave proportionate to their appointment percentage.
• Depending on the employee type an employee may designate up to six days per calendar year of sick leave as protected sick leave if the employee uses the days for any of the purposes specified in the policy and complies with applicable notice requirements.
  • For non-exempt employees, “six days” is calculated by multiplying the number of hours in an employee’s normal work day by six (e.g. an employee who normally works 12-hour days may designate up to 72 hours of sick leave per calendar year as protected and an employee who normally works 8-hour days may designate up to 48 hours of sick leave per calendar year as protected). A “day” for this purpose is calculated in equivalent hours, not instances.    
  • For exempt employees, a protected day of paid sick leave will include any hours of work scheduled on that day that are normally reported as leave.

This expansion provides benefits to an even wider range of teammates, especially those in part-time roles. It also aligns UC Policy with California law. Employees will be granted sick leave via accrual or set bank of sick leave and impacted employee groups will use HBS to record their sick leave usage. 

Employee Action 

If needed, review online resources to support successful use of the HBS Timekeeping System. 

Manager Action 

Managers should be aware that new populations of employees, especially per diems, will have access to paid sick leave. Therefore, some managers should expect additional direct reports to utilize HBS to report usage of sick leave. 

Employees and managers can review UCNet and the HR website for additional information and guidance.