Religous Time off, point in the right direction

jmizz24 Rookie VFR tower

point not pint.

I can't to find the rules on getting time off to go to church and how it is made up. Comp time? Something like that. Is it somewhere in the new contract?

ATC HD Junior Member

Two references for you:

First, this is from the FAA website,

4. Religious Holidays and Observances: Holiday leave or holiday pay is not granted to employees wishing to observe an established religious holy day of their faith on non-designated Federal holidays. Employees may choose to request annual leave (or other paid absences) or leave without pay, and approving officials should accommodate the request unless it interferes with mission requirements. Employees whose religious beliefs require abstinence from work on a religious holy day may elect to be absent that day, and work compensatory time on another day to compensate for the hours absent...link provided below.

https://employees.faa.gov/org/staffo...lws/lws-8-9/#4

Second, look at Article 26, sec. 3 of the new contract,

Section 3. Requests for annual leave to observe the Sabbath, or any other religious, ethnic holiday, or the employee's birthday shall be granted, unless staffing and workload do not permit.

Rosstafari Daaaang. /X

Thanks for putting that up. I was wondering about this myself. I feel a pressing need to celebrate Ramadan, the Sabbath, Yom Kippur, and maybe one of the Sikh ones. Too bad they won't be paying me for it.

Hooray for getting your birthday off, probably.

h2laatc Junior Member

this made me

barty Trusted Member

Best you can probably do is to maybe swap a shift with someone. There are always a few people out there who don't care what time they come into work and will be willing to permanently swap shifts with you so you can go to church without having to take annual leave.

MikeATC Retired FAA, NATCA Member Nashville TN

Allow me to give a little advice on this topic:

If you think you are going to try to use religious reasons to obtain certain days off that you would not normally have the senority to get, "DON'T!" When you signed on the dotted line, you knew full well that the job was 24/7, PERIOD! If having a job that was 24/7 was a problem then you should not had taken the job in he first place! This is kind of like the individual who enlist in the National Guard or reserves, then cries foul when his unit is activated.

Trust me when I warn you that you will not endear yourselfs with your co-workers if you whip out the religious card. The majority of us respect your faith and dedication toward your church, and we will trade shifts to help you attend church, but we draw the line with someone using what religion/faith they are to get days off (a schedule) that you wouldn't normally be able to have at the expense of your co-workers.

I knew an individual that wanted Fridays and Saturdays off, and had made comments that he didn't care how it got them or who he upset. Imagine our surprise when he switches from being Baptist to being Seventh Day Adventist (the ones who don't believe in celebrating Christmas, birthdays, etc.) and went to management demanding Fridays and Saturdays off to practice his religion (he said due to his religion he couldn't work from dusk thursday to dusk saturday).

Management gave him what he wanted even though he was a developmental, which really pissed off everyone in the facility who were FPL's and had wanted those days off and couldn't have them. It didn't help him win fan points when he was often seen out in restraunts and stores when he was suppose to be in church or at home practicing his faith, needless to say he washed out of training.

My best recommendation is if you need a specific schedule to practice your faith and you lack the senority to get that schedule, to either try to trade shifts, or suck it up and accept that you aren't going to chuch this week.

ATC HD Junior Member

To echo what MikeATC said, nothing pisses our crew off more than having to "hot seat" a rotation and work short staffed because someone has to go to church. Sorry you have to work Sunday morning but I'm pretty sure you can find a later service to attend...

HD

Rosstafari Daaaang. /X

Sounds like he enjoyed mixing his religions. Latter-day Saints celebrate holidays and worship on Sundays... I was one. Seventh Day Adventists worship on Saturdays. Jehovah's Witnesses are the ones who don't celebrate a lot of the traditional holidays like birthdays, etc.

And while there's a possibility of a faith group I haven't heard of that says you can't work from dusk thursday till dusk saturday, in undergrad years studying religion and a masters program in divinity, I've never heard of any sect that practices that. Sounds like he ripped off a little bit of orthodox Judaism for that one.

Not that you need me to tell you, but that guy's full of crap.

bsharp Rookie Birmingham, AL

Lmao! Ross, you're like a Webster's Dictionary! There is nothing you don't know!

Rosstafari Daaaang. /X

No no... just the useless stuff. Notice how I steer clear from forums where important questions are asked, like Rules and Regulations?

But if you ever want to play some Trivial Pursuit, we'll throw down.