Defining Closure Days

University closure days are days during the normal work week that either the President (for the Universities or the Health Science Center) or the UNT System Chancellor (for the UNT System) announces that the University is closed for business and thus all non-essential employees are released from the obligation to come to work on the closure day. There are three types of closure days:

• Closure due to inclement weather
• Closure with paid time off
• Closure without paid time off

The type of closure is always included as part of the announcement of the closure. When a closure is announced, further instructions on time reporting will be posted on the BSC website

Closure Due to Inclement Weather

On days that the President or Chancellor have deemed that the weather conditions have made travel unsafe, an announcement is issued by University Relations, Communications and Marketing (URCM) indicating the date, time and duration of the closure. The most common cause of these types of closures are related to snow and ice on the roadways.

The Eagle Alert system is activated to call or text the announcement to all registered phone numbers (done through employee self service). In addition, URCM sends email notifications to all employees in Outlook and update the UNT website (www.unt.edu). If that announcement is made at a time other than normal business hours, the local media (TV, cable and radio stations) is notified and will broadcast the announcement in their news programs.

All salaried employees will receive paid time off equal to the number of hours they were scheduled to work on the day of the closure. Since hourly employees are only paid for time worked, they will not receive payment for the closure time. Employees who are scheduled to be out of the office using personal time off (vacation leave, sick leave, comp time) will not be required to use their personal time off scheduled for the time of the closure.

Closure With Paid Time Off

Some closure announcements indicate that all employees will receive a certain amount of time off for the closure. Examples of this type of closure are:

• National Day of Mourning (death of a former president)
• Half-day off on the day before Winter Break or holiday begins

These types of closures are made at the discretion of the President, Chancellor or the Texas Governor. Closures with paid time off are treated like University holidays in that full-time salaried employees receive the full amount of paid time off announced and part-time salaried employees receive an amount of paid time off in proportion to the percent FTE. The amount of paid time off is NOT related to the number of hours the employee is scheduled to work on the day of the closure. Thus some employees may get more time than needed for the day and thus receive comp time, while others may get less than needed and thus may need to use their personal time off in order to avoid having their pay docked. This only happens when an employee is scheduled to work a differing number of hours on different days of the week.

Hourly employees are only paid for actual time worked and not due paid time off.

These announcements, though often made at the last minute, are usually made during normal business hours.

Closure Without Paid Time Off

Some closures announcements indicate that all employees must use their own personal time off in order to avoid having their pay docked during the closure. Examples of this type of closure are:

• January 2nd when it falls on a Friday but the number of state approved holidays is too low to allow it to be included as a paid holiday

These types of closures are usually scheduled as part of the Board-approved University holidays and, therefore, are usually announced with the holiday schedule for the year.

All salaried employees must either use personal time off (vacation leave or compensatory time) equal to the number of hours they are scheduled to work during the closure day, or have their pay docked for the number of hours not worked and not covered by the use of personal time off.

The employee's pay will be docked when:

1. The employee does not have adequate personal leave balances as of the closure day to cover their scheduled hours on the closure day;
2. The employee is not eligible to use their personal time off (i.e. during their probationary period);
3. The employee elects to have their pay docked rather than use their personal leave.

Employees may avoid being docked by:

1. Using their personal time off (vacation leave or compensatory time) if eligible, sick leave usage in this situation is not permit unless there is a legitimate medical reason;
2. Work an adequate amount of extra time during the same work week (Sunday to Saturday) of the closure (it must be in the same work week);
3. Work an adequate amount of extra time in weeks prior to the closure day only if the employee is eligible to accrue compensatory time;
4. Work during the closure day with the prior approval by the appropriate departmental manager.

Work at times other than normal business hours (either on the closure day or prior to the closure day) must be approved by the departmental manager and will only be granted when there is legitimate departmental need. Work at the employee's residence requires prior approval by the appropriate Vice President.