Accenture renews its leave policy for India

Technology major Accenture has introduced a new leave policy for its employees in the Indian market, effective from September 1, 2023.

Under the new policy, employees will receive three types of leaves: earned leaves, sick and wellness leaves, and casual leaves.

While earned leaves and sick leaves were present in the previous leave policy, casual leaves have been introduced now.

In the new policy, the number of earned leaves has been reduced from 24 to 18. Previously, earned leaves were labelled as vacation hours. However, the number of casual leaves and sick leaves has been increased from 7 to 12.

Furthermore, employees will now be allowed to carry forward 45 days of earned leave. Previously, the maximum number of earned leave days that an employee could carry forward was only 30.

The leave year will start from September 1 and end on August 31.

To avail earned leaves, employees must seek prior approval through email or any other mode of communication. Earned leaves will accrue on a pro-rata basis every fortnight. This means that, for 18 earned leaves in a given year, an employee will accrue 0.75 days of leave every fortnight.

For sick and casual leaves, employees are required to inform their manager through email or any other form of communication as reasonably practicable.

Additionally, employees will be permitted to take a maximum of two consecutive days of casual leave within a fortnight. Those who wish to take more than two days of casual leave will need to inform and obtain approval from their manager in advance.

The new leave policy also stipulates that unauthorised and unnotified leaves will be considered misconduct and may result in disciplinary actions.

The company has also specified that sick and casual leaves can be availed in terms of hours rather than full days.