Compensatory off, and the promise nobody wrote down
Leave earned by working a weekly off or holiday — which is only worth anything to the employee if it exists as a real, dated balance.
What it is
Leave credited for working on a day off. Spent like leave, and normally expiring if unused.
The window
Commonly 30 to 90 days from the date earned. Each credit carries its own expiry.
The trap
Comp-off promised verbally on the shop floor and never recorded. It reappears as a claim at exit.
Compensatory off is leave granted for working on a weekly off or holiday. It is credited as a balance, spent like leave, and normally expires if unused within a set window — commonly 30 to 90 days from the date it was earned.
How it works in practice
A technician who works two Sundays during a shutdown earns two comp-offs, each with its own expiry date.
What to watch for
Comp-off promised verbally and never recorded is the most common source of “I am owed days” arguments at exit.
How Klok handles it
Klok credits comp-off as a real balance with an expiry, and spending it draws down that credit.
Compensatory off (comp-off) FAQs
Must comp-off expire?
Not legally, but an unexpiring balance accumulates into a liability nobody planned for. A stated window makes the benefit real and the liability bounded.
Can comp-off be encashed instead?
Only if your policy says so. Many employers deliberately do not permit it, because encashable comp-off changes the incentive around working rest days.
Does working a weekly off entitle someone to comp-off or to overtime?
That depends on the applicable legislation, the employee's category, and your policy — and the two are not alternatives you can pick freely at the time. Decide the rule in advance and apply it uniformly.
Does compensatory off have to be recorded?
Yes, and unrecorded comp-off is one of the more common sources of exit disputes — the employee remembers working the holiday and there is nothing on the register to show it was ever settled.
Does comp-off expire?
It can, if the policy sets a window and the window is applied evenly. What does not work is expiring it retrospectively because the balance became inconvenient.
Can comp-off be encashed instead of taken?
Only if the policy allows it, and it should be an explicit choice rather than a default. Silently encashing removes the rest the day off was meant to provide.
Stop calculating this by hand
Klok computes it from your own attendance and salary data, every month, with the working shown.