William Lipovsky
Short Answer — If you need to call out of a shift at The Home Depot, you should call your store and notify the manager on duty. The hours will be deducted from your available paid time off, which accrues on a monthly basis. If you don’t have any accrued paid time off, you will receive an “occurrence,” which is the first step in the disciplinary process. If you need a long-term leave, you can apply for an intermittent leave of absence.
The Home Depot Call-Out Policy
To call out of a shift at The Home Depot, whether you have accumulated sick time or not, you should call your store and notify the manager on duty that you are unable to come into work.
With Accumulated Paid Time Off
The Home Depot offers paid personal/sick time to both part-time and full-time employees. Employees start accumulating paid time off after 30 days of employment.
For every month worked, full-time employees earn four hours of paid time off, and part-time employees earn two hours.
If you call out of a shift and you have accumulated paid time off, the hours you miss will be deducted from your available balance of paid time.[1]
Without Accumulated Paid Time Off
The Home Depot’s official policy states that if you call out of work but you do not have any sick time accumulated, you will receive an “occurrence,” which is the first step in the employee disciplinary process.
You can also get an occurrence for being late to work or missing a clock-in or clock-out.[2]
Note that once you start accumulating paid time off, The Home Depot will not retroactively deduct missed hours from your available time off to make up for previous shifts.
You will receive an occurrence and possibly further disciplinary action for calling out, but you will still be able to accumulate more paid time off for the future.[2]
Attendance Policy and Disciplinary Process
You can accumulate three occurrences before human resources will take further action. After three occurrences, you will end up in “coaching” — a designation that rolls off your record after six months with no further occurrences or other issues.
Once in coaching, receiving another occurrence within the six-month period will result in a warning called a “final.” Receiving one more occurrence after getting a final can result in termination.
We gathered this information by contacting Home Depot employees, managers, and human resources workers.[2]
Consecutive Sick Days
While you are only allotted a limited number of occurrences before you face further disciplinary action, employees report that The Home Depot is lenient if you are sick for multiple days in a row but have no sick time accumulated.
If you are sick and need to call off for multiple days in a row, the company will likely only count this as one occurrence instead of separate occurrences.
Taking a Leave of Absence
The Home Depot offers the opportunity for its employees to take an unpaid leave of absence for things like family emergencies, chronic illnesses, or other personal situations.[3]
You can find information about taking a leave of absence by logging into your The Home Depot Human Resources account and navigating to the “Access Leave of Absence Information Center.”
The representatives we spoke with were able to provide specific information about what to do if you have a chronic illness. You can submit doctor-signed paperwork to The Home Depot’s corporate human resources department to apply for an intermittent leave of absence.
For full-time employees, this translates to 480 hours annually that can be used to take time off without pay.
To find out more, you can speak with your store manager and/or contact The Home Depot’s human resources department.
