How to calculate Paid Sick Leave for an exempt employee who also receives an annual bonus at the end of each year.
How an employee who is exempt and is entitled to a non- discretionary bonus is required to be paid for a sick day. Normally, an exempt employee would be entitled to continue to receive his or her full pay without deduction for a sick day of less than 8 hours but the day or partial day of sick leave may be deducted from earned or fronted leave balances. (See discussion regarding application of leave for exempt employees in DLSE Opinion Letter 2009,11.23, pp. 4-7).
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If the employee is exempt under the administrative, executive or professional exemption and no leave time is provided for any other purpose, then normally the salary would continue without deduction for a sick day with the time applied against leave balances and tracked in accordance with Labor Code section 246(h).
The non-discretionary bonus would not figure into the salary of an employee exempt under Labor Code section 515(a) because such bonuses are only figured into the pay of a non-exempt employee in order to determine the regular rate of pay for overtime and to figure the paid sick leave rate under Labor Code section 246(k)(l)-(2).
Here, an employee who is exempt under the administrative, executive or professional exemption and uses a full sick day would be paid for an amount of pay which equals his or her regular salary for the sick day because the leave would be computed based on the regular salary, pursuant to Labor Code section 246(k)(3).
For a full-time employee, the annual salary would be divided by 52 weeks and then by 5 days to determine the daily wage that would have to be paid for a sick day.
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