I take issue with the article’s assertion that it’s a “sneaky payrise” as if it’s somehow dishonest.
I’ve done this before after accumulating several years worth of leave due to a previous employer having strange ideas about project management and the mythical man-month.
I suppose I was kind of pressured into it, but I also liked having a pseudo-bonus that year.
There is a minor advantage to the worker, if they accrued the AL at one pay rate and didn’t use it. Then the use/cash it in at a later date after a pay increase, the accrued AL is payed out at the higher rate.
This isn’t much of an advantage, unless you have had a major correction to your pay rate in the intervening period (like 20-30% increase). For a “normalish” pay rise of 5% the increase is small.
e.g. AL = 0.08 * rate, after a pay rise it is 0.08 * (rate * 1.05) or 0.084 * oldRate (for old accumulated leave).
A side note, it would be better for businesses if AL was accumulated in $ rather than hours. It is better for workers if it is accumulated in hours rather than $. To be fair thought, if it was in $ there would have to be adjustments for time value of money, it would be way more complicated and almost impossible to audit correctly.
It’s probably a good thing that employers are incentivised to make employees take their leave. Imagine if it was in $ and the longer your employer avoided letting you take leave, the more the value eroded due to inflation…