Copyright© 2007 by School Services of California, Inc.

                                      Volume 20                   For Publication Date: June 22, 2007             No. 14

Ask SSC . . . 

When Does Compensatory Time Off Need to be Paid Off? 

Q.                We’ve been told that, by law, compensatory time off (CTO) balances that remain at the end of the fiscal year must be paid off to the employees. Is this correct? If so, where is it in the code? 

A.                 Education Code Section 88028 requires that CTO be used within 12 months after the pay period in which it was earned, but only “ . . . without impairing the services rendered by the employing district.” Although the Education Code does not specify anything about paying off the CTO, it follows that if the employee is unable to use the CTO by the end of the 12-month period it must be paid off. 

Another place to check, though, is in your operating policies and regulations and collective bargaining contracts. We have seen provisions in many of these documents that require the CTO to be paid off earlier than the 12-month time frame specified by the code.

We have seen districts accumulating significant liabilities in this area. A district can have tight controls over the authorization of overtime work that is paid, but may not have the same controls over the authorization of work that results in CTO. One of the best ways to control it is to control the authorization of overtime work, no matter whether it is paid on the next paycheck or compensated with time off.

—Sheila G. Vickers