A tale as old as time and a word to the wise.
Worked in infrastructure for just under a decade and realized the work/life aspect wasn’t conducive to longevity. Queue the job hunting process that took about 3 months to find a suitable replacement. Company was promising, interviews went great, and finally the offer package matched what I was looking for: pay was a small drop from current salary but the work life balance was significantly better with normal 8 hour days and “unlimited within reason PTO”. For reference my previous position was $150k and 4 weeks vacation. This was brought up copiously during the interview as a baseline of why i was willing to take a chip on the pay in exchange for the work life balance. Either way, Accepted the offer and got to work!
My role is managerial at the director level, this context matters. As we get through the first day HR makes a statement to the group going through integration (all base level employees, then myself) that “PTO is discretionary, 2 weeks is generally the expectation for first year employees”, immediate thought is that this wasn’t what was discussed so wait until after and bring it up to HR. The response is “discretionary doesn’t mean unlimited but it doesn’t mean a hard cut point so…”. I let it fizzle as I’ve already left my previous job and wanted to establish myself before fighting this fight any further.
After 6 months my PTO total request has gotten to 11 days (requested some FAR in advance, would be taken at the 9 month point). HR comes over and says they likely can’t approve my recent request due it being over 2 weeks. Discussion ensues where the point continues to be “2 weeks is expected of first year employees” despite the conversation had during the interview and offer process. COO/CEO/Recruiter are all involved at this point and every single one denies EVER saying “unlimited within reason PTO” as a response to my requested 4 weeks. At this point it’s become a contention of what I was promised vs what I am getting.
No big climax, no blowup, no satisfying conclusion. I still work here and for the most part enjoy my day to day, but always be wary of offers you don’t get in writing. Dream jobs aren’t dream jobs unless it’s explicitly stated.