Optimizing vacations between jobs

Life Hacking
1

I’m looking into switching jobs mid-year, so I’ll have H1/2024 with Company A and H2/2024 with Company B. As my vacation allowance will be split pro rata, and we have a lot of vacations in H2, my H2 vacation allowance will not be enough to cover our current plans (thanks mandatory school holidays! :angry: ).

I’m evaluating two options and would be keen to get your input for practicality.

1) having a 1-month gap between jobs to use that time for summer vacations.

  • Advantage: right when I need it, middle of summer. Clear cut durations, no dependencies.
  • Advantage 2: saves me some 5 days in H2 with Company B
  • disadvantage 1: no pay, no pension contibutions, etc.
  • disadvantage 2: as the granularity here is “per month”, I’m inherently vasting some time where I can’t be on vacation but will be just sitting around playing games - quite expensive days to play around :smiley:

Accident vacation should stay up 30 days after resignation, right? Worst case I can book Accident coverage for a month somewhere. Any other downside?

2) Asking for unpaid leave at company B to cover for needed days

  • disadvantage: no gap in the summer
  • disadvantage: onboarding then right after vacations makes me a little inefficient in a new company
  • advantage: actual pay :money_mouth_face:
  • advantage: granularity is days and not months
  • advantage: fully insured along the way

I’m leaning to option 1 despite the pay loss just to have peace of mind.
Happy to get alternative opinions.

2

Accident vacation should stay up 30 days after resignation, right?

Correct.

I guess option 3 would be to finish one month later at company A, but not work that extra month, either with already accrued vacations, or unpaid leave. But unpaid leave at the end of employment sounds difficult to justify.
If you can negotiate that, it sounds better than option 2.

Option 2 might be hard to negotiate as well, depending on how close to the start time you want to take your unpaid leave. Also, I don’t really understand “advantage: actual pay :money_mouth_face:”. Unless you plan on taking significantly less than a month, there won’t be a huge difference there. From what I can find, there won’t be pension contributions if your leave is >=1 month. So guess if your plan is to take 2/3 weeks, then option 2 makes sense. A full month, it doesn’t.

1 Like
3

If you’re optimising (for money), you probably shouldn’t change jobs mid-year.

…unless, of course, the new job pays significantly more.

4

well, please take it as a given input parameter :slight_smile:

any other consideration?

5

I’m trying this, I’ll have about 4 days left so that’ll give me approx 1 week off but not more. I also don’t want to “skip” the last weeks in a bad personal quality of my work, that’s not me.

6

From a completely not money-optimal perspective -
1 month in between jobs is great, I’d take it anytime (and did when I switched jobs last time too).

6 Likes
7

why’s that? I’ve never heard of any reason job changes at year end are better

8

Here‘s one (particularly since insurance was mentioned).

Also, possibly, other bonuses.

4 Likes
9

This is quite extreme with 8% interest in the 2nd pillar. I assume the normal loss of about 1% (1% instead of 2-2.5% otherwise), which would not make anyone stay in their old company.

Yearly bonuses, stock options, etc… those need to be timed well.

10

Wtf that’s completely ridiculous. But good to know.

Regarding bonuses etc, these should ideally be compensated by the new job.

11

Can confirm. With CS/UBS you usually get 3-9%/year interest, but in the year you leave it will be reduced to 1.5%.

For someone in his 50s with several 100k in his pension fund, this can make a huge difference.

3 Likes
12

A less extreme example: I left a job mid 2023 and got the 1%. Finally it was 2.5% for 2023 (which was significantly higher than previous ten year average, so the “worst” year to leave mid-year in a long time). So I lost out on 1.5%, for half a year.
It is a bit unfair. OTH I’ll take July off over January off any day. :smiley:

Bonus was paid out pro-rata though, based on “aims achieved”, so at least that. :v:

4 Likes
13

Wow. I need to change employer!

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14

A consequence of lowering the Umwandlungssatz from 5.4 to 4.4%, but obviously sounds better handing out such interest rates :slight_smile:

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15

nobody takes annuity anyway :slight_smile:

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16

This can indeed be part of the salary negotiation, but it really depends on high-profile roles or candidates.
I guess it’s not standard procedure, or people don’t talk about :face_with_open_eyes_and_hand_over_mouth:

17

When I was switching companies at the end of the year, Dec 31st was my last day, buy my pillar 2 was moved to the new provider on Dec 22nd.

When I asked the old provider if I’ll get any interest for the previous year I got:
There is no additional interest payment going to be made because you left the company before the end of the year.

5 Likes
18

That sounds very strange, I would clarify that.

If a transfer before year-end can have such a negative effect: You can often stay in the pension fund up to 6 months after leaving, depends on the reglement, I guess.

2 Likes