The Office of Personnel Management has invited agencies to
request authority to grant higher leave accrual rates in
certain high-level pay systems.
Under P.L. 108-411, enacted earlier this year, employees
in the Senior Executive Service and senior level and
scientific or professional positions are entitled to
accrue annual leave at the rate of eight hours per pay
period — the maximum federal annual leave accrual rate
— regardless of the length of their federal service. The
law also allows OPM to grant the same leave accrual rate to
positions deemed “equivalent” to the SES, SL and ST systems.
In a memo to agency heads, OPM said that to qualify for
the higher rate, a pay system
