How To Work Part Time as a Full Timer

Do you currently work in a full time job? Do you feel like your work/life balance is out of whack? Are you considering going back to part time, but worried about the cons of part time work? What if there was another way? What if… you could work part time as a full timer? Crazy idea? It could be…. Let’s find out!

Why do people want to be full time in the first place? It’s a dream goal for many because it can provide stability, consistency, and a higher income. You don’t have to wait by the phone all the time for more shifts. You get paid sick time, paid vacation, pension, and medical benefits. You can also get approved for loans and mortgages much easier, and it’s generally considered a status symbol by society’s standards.

If full time is so great, then why would anyone NOT want to be full time? Well, you have to show up for work a lot more and there is an increased potential for burn out. You also have less time to do other things you want like hobbies and general life maintenance. There is less time to spend with people in your life that you value and think are important… your friends, your family, your children.

With working full time, the work-life balance concept shifts more towards the work side.

Defining Part time:

So in order to work part time as a full timer, we first need to define what part time work is. I would define it as anything less than full time hours. Depending on your area of work, this is on average 40 hours per week. Also, part time tends to lack most, if not all of the benefits of full time work. Things like pension plans, sick time, vacation time, a master schedule, etc.

Next, let’s do a quick review of the common and less traditional ways in which people can work part time. We’ll also look at some forms of work that can’t quite be defined as either full or part time.

The “Plain Old” Part Time:

The most common way would be the “plain old” part time, where you are working anything less than full time hours. You live by the phone to take call-ins for more shifts. No benefits, no security. One week you might get up to full time hours, the next week you might get nothing!

The Job Share:

In some unionized environments, two employees can sometimes split a full time line 50/50, in what’s known as Job Sharing. Some benefits to this are getting a minimum number of guaranteed hours and having a “master” schedule. However, it’s still lacking all the other full time benefits noted above.

The “Point” Full-Time Equivalent (FTE):

On a rare occasion, you might see someone in a full time line but only actually working a portion of it. Something like 0.8 FTE or 0.7 FTE. It’s still considered full time, but all the benefits may be prorated to the equivalent 70-80 percent, like vacation time. You may also need to front the remainder of the health premiums yourself to maintain membership in the group benefits plan. This would usually be a special arrangement with your work due to very specific circumstances, and not commonly available.

*This one is actually considered a bit of a special case. It’s almost more of a modified work agreement based on things like undue hardship issues or human rights issues. One example would be if you’re having difficulty organizing child care, then something like this arrangement could apply.*

Teaching:

Public/High School/Post-Secondary full time teachers work for the majority of the year. When school’s done, they get 2 to 4 months off. Of course many put in a lot of unpaid time with extra curricular activities, grading and planning. Those things may put them over 40hrs per week for many parts of the year.

The Seasonal Worker:

Jobs in this category are things like fishing, snow removal, construction, etc. When the season is over for the year, the workers go on unemployment insurance until work becomes available again.

The Sabbatical Year:

Sabbaticals are most often heard of with regards to teachers, but other professions can have them as well. This is where you might work 4 years paid at 80% of your wages, while the remaining 20% goes into a sabbatical account. Then on your 5^th year, you are able to go on leave while still getting paid 80% of your salary (20% per year x 4 years). I’ve also heard of other ratios such as working 3 years at 75% pay, then taking the 4th year off.

It’s an interesting idea that is not usually explored by people. Most often the goal would be to take an educational course, or travel during the sabbatical year. A big disadvantage to this is that you can’t really control what’s going on in your sabbatical account while you are contributing to it. The money is also generally “locked away” until you go on leave.

The Weekend Worker:

The “weekend worker” classification exists in some workplaces. This is where you only work weekends, and get the weekdays off. This typically results in slightly less than full time hours actually worked. At my work place, full time hours is 37.5hrs/week. However, a weekend worker only works 30hrs/week, yet paid for the entire 37.5 hrs. Pros of this type of work are that you get full time benefits without working “full time” hours; cons being that you have to work every weekend. Vacation days are also used up at an accelerated rate, equivalent to working less than the 37.5 hrs.

The Weekend Worker classification probably comes the closest to “working part time as a full timer” by definition. However it’s still quite restricted.

Unfortunately, all of the above ways are either just part time without benefits, or positions where you’re still working mostly full time. Many have significant downsides to them which makes them a challenging option for most people to decide to explore.

Here’s a Secret: No one actually works full time

Funny enough, unless you are a full timer who NEVER EVER takes ANY vacation or stat time EVER (which is extremely rare), then you are not actually working “full time” hours. My job considers 1950hrs per year as full time. New full timers start with 5 weeks total of paid vacation and statutory holiday time (vacation/stat time) per year. If you subtract these from the 1950hrs, you end up with ~1710hrs, which is only 88% of “Full Time” hours. Add in a bit of (legitimate) sick time here and there, and you’re now into the low to mid 80s%! Translating this into a typical “9-5” schedule would be like only working ~4.1 days per week. Interesting, no?

Someone that has been working for ~25 years might have the maximum vacation/stat time available (9 weeks). Subtracting this time from the 1950hrs “full time” definition has the person only working ~1598hrs/year. This is equivalent to ~82% of full time. Maybe even into the high 70s% with a bit of sick time included. This works out to slightly under 4 days per week worked for a “9-5” job.

So if no one actually works full time, then what the heck are you talking about when you say, “how to work part time as a full timer”?

Enter the Undiscovered Realm of Unpaid Vacation to Super Boost Your Time Off!

Vacation time varies from workplace to workplace. Where I am, I currently have 6 weeks of combined vacation/stat time. This can reach of potential of 9 weeks if you hit the 25 year seniority mark. Seems like a lot? It’s not. We can do much better than that!

A couple years ago, I noticed a pattern. I would submit requests for paid vacation for the year. Occasionally something would come up that I would want to take more vacation for. This vacation would be granted. But because I had already used up my entire paid vacation bank, I would get approved for unpaid vacation.

So a few years ago, I decided to try an experiment and request more time off… A lot more! I had 6 weeks of total paid vacation/stat time at the time. I decided not only to put in for those 6 weeks, but also request another additional 6 weeks for unpaid vacation leave.

And it was granted!

I almost couldn’t believe it. And then I couldn’t believe that no one else appeared to have thought of this before.

That’s THREE months of time off each year! No, I didn’t ask for all of it in one gigantic 3 month long vacation (or something silly like that)! I used it in strategic places throughout the year (usually one or two shifts off every 2 weeks)

I’m currently in shift work and mainly work 12hr shifts (paid for 11.25hr); days, nights, weekends, holidays. My full time schedule over a two week period is 6.7 shifts (75hrs) before any vacation. Since doubling my annual vacation from 6 to 12 weeks by using unpaid vacation, I’ve reduced my schedule to 5.1 shifts. This could be even further reduced to 4.3 shifts, if you had the maximum vacation/stat time of 9 weeks.

Now it’s really starting to feel like part time!

The cool thing about this is still maintaining full time benefits while really only working part time hours.

UPDATE: In the spring/summer 2021, my boss asked me about all the vacation I was taking. Then they asked me to stop because someone had complained about not receiving their vacation even though they were more senior. So I had to take back a whole boat load of time-off requests back. That sucked. The strange thing about it was that they didn’t seem to be aware about my situation until someone complained about it. It was as if neither payroll, nor staffing, nor anyone else was keeping track of how many days I had requested off over the past four-ish year!

And the other thing too is that they could have denied all my extra requests. But they didn’t. They kept on approving them. Apparently Full Time workers aren’t supposed to take unpaid vacation… Then why is there an area on my pay stuff indicating “unpaid vacation”?!?! Anyway. My boss said the onus is on me to keep track of how much vacation I have earned/used, which is kind of BS if you ask me. If they want to force me to come into work more, thereby forcing me to earn more, well, I guess there are worse things out there.

I’m looking into other possible ways for more time off though, like Leave of Absences for a day here or there. LOAs are technically considered separate from the vacation bank. So we’ll see how that works out. Also it has made me more seriously think about the sabbatical year strategy too.

But how much is it costing you?

We have always been fairly frugal and spent less than we earned. It hasn’t been too big of a deal to not get paid for a day here or there. This was still true when we transitioned to a single-income family and boosted by focusing our spending on efficiency and value. But, taking DOUBLE the vacation that you’d normally be allotted – and half of it being completely unpaid – is a big step up from a day or two.

So some people might be thinking, “How much money are you losing by taking all that unpaid time?”

The way I like to think of it is, “How much time am I gaining?”. More time to spend with family and kids. More time to play. More time to enjoy life. It’s a much improved work-life balance.

I mean, have you ever seriously thought why full time is clocked in at ~40 hours a week? Who came up with that number?* Is it the right number? Is it too much? Your 40 hours might be different than my 40 hours, but it’s still 40 hours! Add in 30-60 minutes of twice a day commutes, and you’re getting close to 50 hours a week.

But to answer the question of “cost” for all this extra and highly enjoyable unpaid time, here it is. I’m giving up about $11,500 in gross income. However, when all the deductions are factored in – taxes, union dues, and health premiums, etc – then that $11,500 is closer to $7,000 net. I could offset some of this “loss” by working overtime shifts. But then I would be working more, which would defeat the entire purpose of this idea.

A side bonus of making less money is actually making MORE money through increased tax refunds! Things like the Canadian Child Tax Benefit, Canada Workers Benefit, GST rebate credits, etc. Another item that also helps is reduced vehicle costs for gas and maintenance.

On a side note, there is a hidden lost opportunity cost in respect to less potential RRSP contribution room. Normally, everyone gets an increase in RRSP contribution room every year equivalent to 18% of your income.* For me, this works out to losing about $1000 of new contribution room, as well as ~$1300 from my employer matched pension contributions.

Barriers

There are some people who may have serious guilt about not coming in to work or not picking up shifts that are offered to them. You should NEVER feel bad saying “No” to a shift you don’t want or need.. “But my co-workers need me! And I feel bad saying no to a shift”. Don’t Even!!! Put that guilt away! It’s not yours to own! And it’s definitely not your responsibility to ensure that your work place is appropriately staffed. If you have a hard time saying “No”, try screening all your work calls through an answering machine to give you time to decide whether you really want to pick up that shift without feeling pressured.

To help you feel even better about taking time off, you can think of it this way: you’re helping out others. By taking time off, you provide someone else an opportunity to pick up extra shifts. Someone that may need it much more than you do.

Another barrier might be a lack of seniority regarding vacation approvals. But if you’re requesting time off throughout the year instead of all at once, you can likely get around this most of the time.

And obviously, if you spend more than you earn, then you won’t be able to afford to take time off with this strategy. That’s why it is so important to be able to live within your means.

Where is the line and how far can you push it?

In theory, how far could one go with working part time as a full timer? There are a number of variables that can affect a strategy like this. Things like your work place policies, whether you are unionized or not, the number of employees, etc.

Where I work, there are a few items in the union contract, seem to present a theoretical hard limit (limitations will differ among workplaces):

1) I cannot take more than 30 days in a row of unpaid leave, or else seniority and service will stop accruing. (This could be mitigated by putting a day or two of paid leave in the middle to reset the 30 day count, but this strategy is not about taking a whole month off anyway.)

2) I need to have 1525hrs of combined work and/or paid leave throughout the year to be entitled to receive the annual paid vacation days. (paid leave can be in the form of vacation, stat holidays, sick leave, etc.)

3) Total “full time” hours per year is clocked in at 1950hrs (because of unpaid breaks)

4) Vacation and stat days are worth 7.5hrs

So, if I subtract my current ~6 weeks of paid vacation/stat-time from 1525hrs, I would only have to work 1285hrs a year to maintain vacation entitlement and benefits. That’s just 66% of “full time” hours. This is equivalent to working ~3 days/week at a “9-5” job (at 7.5hrs per day).

If an employee reached the max vacation/stat time of 9 weeks, then by the above parameters they would only have to work 1173hrs, or 60% of “full time” hours. Both of these examples are still before any applicable sick time, which would further reduce the hours worked. Not too bad at all.

Super Boosting

The chart below compares a “9-5” job to a 12hr shift work job. It shows different combinations of paid and unpaid time off, compared to working “full time” hours.

Chart Assumptions:

• one vacation/stat day is 7.5hrs for shift workers and 8 hrs for “9-5” workers
• one vacation “week” is 5 vacation days
• there are 12 statutory holidays per year
• 2 weeks is used as an estimate for the 12 stat holidays, but the actual hours (ie: 7.5 x 12 = 90hrs) are included in the specific “hourly” calculations.
• a “9-5” worker is paid for 8 hours per day, 2080hrs per year
• a 12hr “shift worker” is paid for 11.25hrs for a 12hr day, 1950hrs per year.
• “paid time” is defined as including vacation and stat time.
• Assumed yearly “vacation” is at intervals of 3, 5, 7 weeks with 2 weeks of “stat time” included to make total “paid time” shown as 5,7,9 weeks respectively.
• Any “unpaid time” listed is the equivalent in full weeks of the “paid time”
• No sick time is included, which would further reduce working hours

Some Take Aways:

• The theoretical hard limit equivalents for a “9-5” worker are listed at 7.5hr paid days (instead of 8hrs). This is because that’s what it is for my workplace.
• It’s interesting to note that a brand new employee with just 5 weeks vacation/stat time, could get more time off than a senior employee who has 9 weeks vacation/stat time, just by requesting an equal amount of unpaid time off.
• An employee who has the max vacation/stat time of 9 weeks would only work 65% of full time hours if they requested the equivalent unpaid time off.
• At my work place, a full timer could work as little as 60% of full time hours if they wanted to. This would still maintain full time status with benefits.
• The employee is never paid less than 78% of full time wages, even with working as low as 60% of full time hours.
• If an employee didn’t take ANY of their stat or vacation time (which usually NEVER happens), there’s a potential to make more than 100% of wages. Depending on vacation amounts, you could make as much as 118% of full time wages with banked time payouts each year..

Adaptability:

The Super Boost chart above shows a couple different scenarios, based on annual “vacation” allotments of 3,5, and 7 weeks (5,7,9 weeks respectively if you include stat time). If you happen to be in between, above or below, you can sub yourself in between the rows where appropriate.

This is just a framework that can be adapted to your own needs. Perhaps you have 5 weeks of paid vacation, but only want two weeks of unpaid time off instead of 5. You can do that. Maybe you want an additional five weeks of unpaid time, but your employer will only will approve two weeks…. It’s still better than no extra time!

Future plans:

By using this strategy, I have been taking approximately equal unpaid time and paid time off (currently 6 weeks and 6 weeks). The total unpaid time is more variable and sometimes I might end up with 7 weeks. For me, it strikes a relatively descent mix between work-life balance. In the future, I may progressively take more and more unpaid vacation time. This may likely coincide with any increases in paid vacation allotments. Monetary losses could be offset by any potential future wage increases.

Other Interesting Applications:

• An intriguing idea might be to piggy back this strategy onto a sabbatical year plan, or onto a weekend worker strategy. Or even combining all three together; weekend worker/sabbatical plan/part-time-as-full-timer. I haven’t personally tested these combos, but it is interesting food for thought.
• This can be a good strategy for older folks who are nearing the end of their career and feeling burnt out. Working in more of a part time capacity could be a nice way to ease into retirement.
• Sometimes an employer may offer an employee a shift while they’re on paid vacation. If the employee accepts this, they may get time and a half for that shift, as well as their paid vacation day back (depending on their collective agreement). There is more earning potential this way and it can help offset some of the unpaid time that was taken. However, there may also be some moral/ethical issues to take into consideration when doing this. I personally don’t do this as I prefer my time off.

Wrapping Up

There isn’t a hard rule saying that you have to take any time off at all. You can work “full time” hours if you really want to, and make even more income with banked time payouts. But if you’ve been feeling the grind lately and it’s starting to wear you thin, then there are lots of benefits to working part time as a full timer. You get to work way less hours than normal, while still receiving all the perks!

And though this strategy may not work for every job, I think it can work for a number of them (ie: jobs with large numbers of staff, healthcare, shift work jobs, etc.). In some areas it may be more challenging, such as smaller workplaces, self employment, or where you’re the only one who can do your job. Have a look at your work place policies and union collective agreements and see what they say. But you’ll never know until you try, and I encourage you to try!

I plan on continuing to do this for the foreseeable future. At least until they tell me I can’t. Which they haven’t yet. I’m not getting paid for it after all so it must not be a big deal. I’m choosing time over money. I hope you do too.

Have you ever tried this at your workplace? Would you ever? Let me know in the comments!

*https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eight-hour_day Here is some background on the 8hr day / 40hr work week. That’s not to say that 40hrs is the right amount, just its origins.

*The 18% yearly increase in RRSP contribution room can greatly affected by Pension Adjustments (P.A.). The P.A. is applied if you contribute to an employer sponsored pension plan to make it fair those who aren’t part of one.