Submitted by supermagicpants t3_zxhu1l in LifeProTips
During Christmas, for example, most people use their PTO. Therefore, the flow of work is slow, and it can feel like a holiday anyway. If possible, take time off when most of your peers will not be taking time off.
(I learned this lesson too late in my career. Instead of wondering why I feel burned out after the holidays when everyone is back in the office, I take time away after the holidays instead.)
Hello fellow library employee! It has been so slow for us during December as well. That will all change during the Summer Reading Program though.
This is good advice. If you go on a travel vacation that doesn't involve a big vacation, it will be cheaper and fewer people will travel. Less pain overall
Are you projecting out into June/July? Or do you live in one of those strange places that does the weather all backwards
Yeah, try being the IT support for a retailer during holiday season when 40% of all yearly transactions take place. The entire holiday season was crunch time.
what kind of retail, may I ask?
Believe it or not, pharmacy retail. And yes, holiday season was their biggest.
interesting, never thought that people don’t need pharmacy products whole year round.
In grocery, it is maybe +10% of normal month, nothing too exciting
Well, to be fair, it wasn't just pharmaceuticals, but also had health devices and other assortment. A lot of people buy health devices for their near and dear ones I suppose.
Office jobs
accountants have offices and some librarians do as well
Yup, can confirm. I am a librarian who works in an office.
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International IT industry is great. Other countries shut down anything except emergency work the last two weeks, and clients generally aren't that demanding since no ones in the office. Since we can't put in work orders and were not taking work orders it's pretty great.
This. I work an office job with a lot of Americans overseas, and last year at Christmas I was the only one in the office. It could have been slow, but thanks to the nature of the work we had several emergencies in that time period that I was handling solo.
THEN, they all got Omicron at their Christmas and New Years gatherings and were stranded back in the States for a few more weeks while I got pummeled with work. That's (I hope) a less likely situation in future years, but my holidays last year were a mess.
At least it earned me a stellar yearly review.
Lol, mandatory overtime.
I have a job where I am the only one who does it. If I take off when things are slow it’s fine. If I take off the rest of the year I have mountain of work pile up while I’m gone and it is stressful before and after I take off.
Same. Vacation days are garbage if you know coming back to the office means you're walking into a dumpster fire.
Plus, flights and hotels are cheaper off season. And most national parks and scenic or tourist areas are far less crowded.
Underrated. If you take time off with everyone else, you’re less behind than the otherwise.
As long as it is not your own business, I see no issues there. So, the work is going to be done later. It's not your problem, it's your bosses problem for not hiring appropriate number of people to do the job.
This is easier said than done.
It takes some mental work if you were raised in hustle culture, but it's worth it. It took me 8 years and I'm proud to say that I can happily leave my work at scheduled time regardless of what's going on there and enjoy rest of my day care free. I'm not yet at the "don't give a shit about anything as long as they pay me" level, but maybe one day I'll get there.
It took me a long time, so I advice each and every one of you - start now. And start small. Scheduled turn off your work phone/email is a good beginning to a journey of letting go :)
Same. There’s so much stuff piled up it’s not worth it
been doing this since i started my career i have no kids so i have no problem logging in and making sure there's no alerts during this super down time of year and ill usually grab a pto day or 2 after new years when everyone comes back grumpy
I envy those of you that can do this. Those of us with kids who are home on their 2- or 3-week break from school are stuck catering to those bums.
Daycare closed the entire week between Christmas and new years so essentially forced to save PTO to use that week.
Damn freeloaders
>During Christmas, for example, most people use their PTO. Therefore, the flow of work is be slow, and it can feel like a holiday anyway.
I wish. The last two weeks are always a scramble because jackasses take the last two weeks off leaving year end to those who are working
“Jackasses” for using their time when they want? Waaahhhhhh
This has also been my experience
This affects all work regardless of office work.
Yeah. It always messed up my work in clinical drug manufacturing. We shut down for the week between xmas and new years, because everyone always wanted to take it off anyways (usually 23 Dec to 02 Jan we didn't work). But the week before and after we were always super busy to make sure we had enough stuff in stock, or catch up on stock because drug shipments still went out. We always had people take off the week before or after so they could have 2 weeks off straight. Even though it was only 3 people at a time, it would fuck us over pretty bad.
Not sure I'd call em jackasses ass this is just sorta how things go. Not minizing that it's a PITA for those still working
The ole company man eh
Laughing and crying at the same time being in HR
Also take your holiday when the colleague you hate is at work. This way you get twice as much time away from them.
The last week of work at my work is great - we knocked off about 3 hrs early for the Monday Tuesday Wednesday, and literally for the last day on Thursday we came in, had a BBQ breakfast then went home!
What’s in a Bbq breakfast? Never heard of this before.
Bacon + eggs + hash brown on a burger lol.
This has been go to since I got my corporate job. I always work the week of Xmas and New Years. My co workers are all out, no meetings, and can't get a ton done. Even better since I started working from home. Bonus is that on the off chance something breaks, you look good for being around to take care of it (I work in IT)
Same boat here in IT. No one is around to have problems anyway, just hang out and monitor what small thing might need attending to. It's much easier to ask for time off over the spring and fall when everyone is back after all their winter/summer vacations.
Same
Better tip: Use your time off however you want to use it!
Agree with this! So many of our vendors and my co-workers are off this week, I'm getting caught up on so many little things I kept putting off. Plus its super quiet around here and I can just listen to a podcast and not worry about all the chit chat lol
Shhhhhhhh dont share the secret! 😅
I do this every year in my office job and now that I work from home full-time, it means getting work done in 1/2 the time (no distractions), and getting paid to watch YouTube, do laundry, and meal prep for the rest of my day.
Highly recommend if you don't have social events/travel between 25-31
good idea but will work for those who can carry over their pto to next yr. Most cannot carry over more than 40 hrs to next yr. U hv to take it or lose it
What a ridiculous system you have over there. In Australia you can carry over your PTO virtually unlimited. If your balance gets too high your employer will usually encourage you to take some tho.
I've only got 1 week PTO at the moment, but I also have 4 weeks paid sick leave saved up too.
The "system" is just whatever policy the company has in place, obviously most companies want the employees to use up their leave every year as otherwise it could mean many staff looking for months or more off together. My own company will only allow 35 hours to be carried over but that policy only came in in 2000 and I member of staff who started on the old policy currently has 1600 hours carried over
True, but perhaps more importantly, companies don’t want to pay out months of saved leave to employees who resign.
Lucky in Australia our laws aren't written by companies. It's by law ya get minimum 4 weeks PTO plus 2 weeks sick PTO (for permanent full time employees) - every year. And it carries over every year.
That's very sad someone had 1600hrs leave accumulated, that means they didn't take much leave during the years!
Do companies find ways to cheat the system? Like avoiding permanent full time designations? For sure that’s what companies in the US would do, and they would pay politicians to keep that legal.
Keeping in mind I am talking generally here, and am not a lawyer etc.
You can employ someone as "casual" which means you basically work shift to shift - and generally they only have to give 1 day/shift notice for termination. You don't earn PTO on casual. Usually these employees are paid a better rate. But they have less perks. Casual work is pretty good in certain scenarios, I've done it before.
But to attract good workers, workplaces are usually permanent. There's usually a 6 month probation period - in which the first 6 months they can fire you if they're not happy with your performance etc. After being made permanent, they need a really good reason to fire someone (wilful negligence etc).
TLDR: Labour laws/unions are great.
If a company does the dodgy, they're opening their selves up to litigation.
I'm not saying it doesn't happen in Australia, but I would imagine it happens a lot less than the US etc.
8 what?
We have no "system" companies just do whatever the fuck they feel like.
The idea that you have to save up sick leave is also a ridiculous system to some of us, fyi
..... right? What is your system
Have up to 7 sick days in a row off without a doctor's note.
If you're ill before you take annual leave, you can take it as sick leave instead.
If you don't take all your annual leave because of illness, it carries into next year.
There are no limits on how much sick leave you can take, but after 4 consecutive weeks you're considered long-term sick. The employee can dismiss you after this, but only after exhausting all options that might help you get back to work, e.g. offering for you to return part-time etc.
My sister in law had cancer just after having a baby last year - her company allowed her to take the normal 1 year maternity leave, but delay the start until after her cancer treatment had concluded (which was taken as sick leave). They've given her the 6 months of sick leave she needed, and then the year maternity on top. All paid.
I'm really sorry to hear about your SIL. Hope she's better.
It's great her work did as much as they did to help her. Is that the norm tho?
Ours carry for 6 months for contract employees and a year for permanent staff. So all 2022 leave days have to be used by 31 Dec 2023 for me.
Then you use it earlier in the year. Pretty simple really. Also I think you missed a "not" maybe try proofreading.
This LPT is all dependent on the job. At my old job, no one could take any PTO during the blackout dates from mid november to early January. My current job, 80% of my office is out of vacation, it's only a few of us here and it's really slow. I don't mind this at all compared to my last job which was retail.
These slow days do feel like a holiday for me. I get paid to just keep the office open and answer the phones, i'm cool with that.
I use some PTO for my birthday. I usually take the whole week.
Since it's a religious holiday, they can't say no. Non-negotiable. I'm still considerate about it and tell my employer what days I want so they can anticipate.
Out of curiosity, what religion deems birthdays as religious days?
LaVeyan!
Ah that makes so much sense, cheers thanks for response!
Not just that, but airfare is dirt cheap too!
This depends on your job. I like to take vacation during this holiday time because I won’t come back to a thousand emails and be behind since most clients are out of the office as well. If I take vacation during a regular time in the year it’s super stressful when I get back because I’ve fallen behind.
Same here. I'm a real estate accountant and this week is dead. No one is making deals, buying property, etc., they're just waiting for the new year. I checked my inbox yesterday and only had 10 emails, instead of the usual 80-100 I would have if I took off any other time of the year.
I’m in my first year at a office job and am learning this. We have a good amount of leave that must be used by the end of the year every year. So most of the office has been out these last couple of weeks trying to use it before they lose it. I did the same, but I still glance at my inbox. It’s been mostly empty- the complete opposite of how it usually is. If I had just worked instead, I could likely get by doing next to nothing since almost everyone else is out of the office. Next year I’m planning better.
Addendum: this only counts if you work non-customer service jobs. Customer service jobs are sssoooo much worse during the holidays.
This is great advice because when you take a travel vacation not associated with a major holiday, it'll be cheaper and there will be fewer people traveling. Far less agony altogether
I haven’t worked since December 16th because my entire department took PTO. We’re all back on the 3rd. It was basically 7 free PTO days (4 were holidays).
That's exactly my strategy.
Soo. Thing is, this might work for you but not everyone else in your family. As you said, most take holiday season off. It’s when family coordinate to be off at the same time. If you’re plan is to relax then sure. But if your plan is to visit family and actually hang out with them use your PTO on holidays
I save mine for my birthday and tattoo appointments!
My company is closed between Christmas and New Years. This year we closed at 1 pm on the 23rd and we don’t go back until the 3rd. That way we have full use of our PTO days when we want them.
I’m an executive assistant and live by this rule. Never take vacation when the boss does. Take it a week before or after and it’s like getting double the time off
I’m in south Florida so I usually schedule mine in the heart of summer where it’s brutal to work outside
I do this too! It’s working out for me very well so far — in fact both of my bosses are out this week, so they told me to just “take it easy and watch your emails.” I’ve still got little things to finish up here and there but for the most part, I can take my time and relax. I worked about 2 total hours on the 23rd and called it a day.
This does not apply to healthcare. Again, this does NOT apply to healthcare.
But yeah everyone else enjoy that holidays :)
This has nothing to do with office jobs, it pertains to any job.
my boss just gives everyone still in the office during christmas times unnecessary work and projects just cause „nobody will be here anyways and better than sitting around not doing much“ while he is off work, goddamn they always come up with random shit at the year-end and stress you out to finish it that same year
god forbid that people take it a bit slow and chilled during christmas days
I love America. “LPT. Don’t spend time with your family during the holidays because you only get a little PTO so you need to min max it.”
Been doing this years. For medical reasons. And it works like that.
Use your PTO when you need it or want to.
Regardless of the season.
If you planned and saved it for the Holidays, good for you.
Sounds like a usa problem.
Done this my whole office career. The vast majority of years it is glacially slow the week between Xmas and NYE. Did have a year that was a bit busy for the half of the department that was at work.
It's still the best time to see my family as the one out of state son. I wouldn't change it for anything. Mom, dad, and brothers are free for anything. Christmas movies and music are playing. It's the reason I take time off right now.
Plus travel tends to be cheaper after the holidays too!
As a business owner. I can confirm this is a good plan for holidays. Plus during off seasons, prices for hotels and travels are much cheaper.
Before I had kids, I enjoyed taking off the first or second full week of January (depending on the how the holidays fall. It was easy going when everybody was gone over Christmas and not everyone is back until the first full week. Then it got crazy busy because everyone wanted to start projects in the new year. So I took that week off, and after a week or so everything was back to the a normal pace.
This is my first year of my life accruing PTO, and now have a decent amount saved. The company I work for follows a federal calendar which means that only holidays observed by the government we get off. This means that after the holiday in mid january, we have a six month long holiday from holidays. Everyone in my company is taking PTO days right now, but I'm not, I'm going to use some to ensure I have at least a few 3 day weekends during that break.
Take time off whenever tf you want instead of setting some arbitrary rule and calling it advice.
It’s sad that you haven’t learned that so late in your career.
True in my case. Thanks!
Nooooo donor do this!!! If you take time off when everyone else is working your inbox will be filled making your return even worse. If you’re off when everyone else is your back to work will be much easier
And use your sick time for those mental health days when you need it.
Honestly it's the opposite for me. Nobody else does my job so when I'm out of office work piles up, emails come in, stressful crap happens and I end up having to deal with it anyway or when I get back and I'm buried.
However, if I take my vacation days during the holiday season (like right now when globally my industry more or less shuts down) then I'm more likely to get uninterrupted restful time off and not come back to the office walking into a dumpster fire.
This doesn't apply to all industries but can appreciate the LPT. I am in manufacturing and the holidays are far more complicated, crazy and often busier.
ya i very much wanted all 4 days off this week. however, it is slow at work. lots of people are out. so i opted for just this friday off. why burn 3 days when i’m at work basically being left alone. although i’m a single dude so i don’t have much else to do lol while other people are probably traveling or spending time w the kids
LPT : take PTO for non-holiday seasons so you don't have to see your family on holidays.
I'm a software engineer in a manufacturing company, and the holiday season is insane for us, so everyone takes the week after off. Which means there's no work to be done, so it's best not to take that time off because I ain't got to do shit
Exactly. I managed two people with younger kids, so by me covering the holidays they could take family time off. I use the week between Xmas & New Year's to clean out my inbox and hopefully start out the year with it empty. Currently rewriting some code onto a new system, and having full days with no interruptions are priceless!
Eh. I took like 4 days of PTO and have been off since the 23rd and will be going back on the 3rd. It’s like back in the old days of school when I had 2 weeks of for winter break. Chilling around Christmas and new years is great. My job is the kind that’s randomly slow throughout the year though. So holiday slow is like whatever.
Completely disagree.
I always take off around holidays to maximize connective days off. For instance, every company I've worked at gives Thanksgiving and Black Friday off. I always take the Mon, Tue, and Wed off that week. It only costs me 3 days from my bank, but I get 9 days off in a row.
... So sit in an empty office by yourself during the holidays doing nothing, why?
Lucky my job is up to u (not office related but more on the field)…. You can choose to work between chrissy and ny or not….. there are plenty of work to go around…
Why not both? I have 25 payed days off a year, gotta spend then somewhere
I have always followed this since the early days of my career, avoiding taking PTO during the peak holiday season or long weekends.
You save yourselves from many other issues like overpriced flights and hotel charges. If planning a road trip, you can avoid holiday traffic while on the road
Been doing this for 10 years strong. Strongly stand behind this advice if you have a job that enables you too.
This! I am actually doing this right now. Some of my colleagues did leave for PTO and I am here working from home just pretending to be busy.
My company has the week of Christmas to New Years off, and I like to come into work during that time to rack up my floating holidays count. It's nice, my company also does holiday pay this week, gives everyone on-site a $20 voucher for food, and we get the holiday hours on top of it. It's also nice and relaxing since it's so quiet.
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Unless you're married to a teacher.
This is a nice idea but everyone wants to get hardcore cranking with projects in January after December slacking, so getting time off can become impractical to impossible.
I use PTO during xmas/Thanks Giving so I can have 1-1.5 months off to go back home. ~ 8-10 business days off Thanksgiving & Xmas & New Year give is really huge when flying alone take 24-30 hrs one way.
Ironically if everyone who can follows the LPT then the time in the office around the holidays would no longer be slow.
That, or take it the week BEFORE the actual holiday.
In the army, and from I've seen the people that try to take leave right after the holidays usually get shut down
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Nah. I take 3 days of PTO, and get twelve days off for Christmas, without losing any pay.
Or better suggestion. Use your PTO for its intended purpose. Need an extended weekend to re-energize? Got a trip planned in a few months? Friend coming back to visit for a month and needs a pickup at the airport? PTO is there to help you in maintaining that work life balance, so use it when you need it. Don't sit on it until the end of the year and then schedule it.
That is quite the insight man, that's a good point :).
Surprisingly clever idea perhaps hehe :).
Thank you for mentioning that and props.
It is true it can like add 1.5x to one's holiday days perhaps hehe :), clever.
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Travelling at the holidays is a mugs game. And even after this Christmas travel chaos people still wont figure it out.
Taking 3 PTO days got me 10 days in a row off. So no thatnks.
The flow of work is absolute hell this week because lots of people have time off, but clients still want shit done yesterday.
counterpoint, when you take vacation days around holidays off you reap the benefit of longer time away from work.
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I normally perfer to work holidays for 2x monies and take my time off around important family events like my Wedding anniversary and people's birthdays (Mine, My wife's, my son's etc)
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My job gives us the entire week leading up to Christmas off, and then we work from home on call the week leading up to new years. They also give us Thursday through Friday off the week of Thanksgiving. And we get the rest of the standard holidays off. All paid of course.
This frees up our vacation time to use during the rest of the year.
I'm absolutely loving the holiday moratorium at work. This week I sat around and did pretty much nothing and it was GLORIOUS! I'm usually rather busy day to day in my field of work.
exactly! my holiday leave is not until the end of jan, because why the hell would i want to be here when everybody gets back and is all gung ho for work in the new year!
fuck that, "work" christmas and new years, take vacation when shit actually hits the fan.
LOL! This presumes they don't ding you with mandatory PTO when you already turned down a family vacation because you would have to work that week! Now, I missed seeing family AND I won't have the PTO to see them for the reschedule next month!
Ain't life a bitch?
My ceo just closes the office over the holidays because she’s aware that everyone who doesn’t use PTO over the holidays has this attitude anyways.
I do this also. Not as easy once you have kids though as the holidays are at the same time.
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This really depends on you. If you like the quiet, great but I’d rather be off with my kids at Christmas but it’s not worked that way this year. I don’t mind it but I don’t think this is really a LPT. More of a ‘if you like quiet times at work, go in over the holidays’ tip.
My collegues told me not to do that because it is considered a dick move
Sometimes this isn’t possible. At least in Australia, it’s legal for a business to “force shutdown” over Christmas which requires employees to use some of their annual leave, about 2-3 days worth out of the 4 weeks we get per year.
As a tradie if I worked over Xmas I'd be absolutely pumped all day long
The reason many people take time off then is to travel for as long of a time period as they can whilst using the minimum amount of accrued leave.
Truth is that managers are not fools (especially in B2B companies where the clients are also not working) so in my company they ask you to submit a special request if you want to work during the holidays. Not forcing you to take time off but making it more complicated
I was the only person in a 5 person team working yesterday. Turned on laptop, logged in and went back to sleep 👌
Taking time off around the holidays when things are slower is much better for me, because I can actually relax and not stress out about all the piled up work that I’m falling behind on.
I did this for years. The period between Xmas and New Year's especially was always dead, and you could spend your days in the office, coming in late, surfing the web, watching movies, even going out to do a bit of shopping.
With kids though, it's just not worth it. For a start i want to spend some time with them when they're not at school. But even working from home, you have this "thing" hanging over you when you know you're supposed to be working but the kids want to sit and play the Switch instead.
Taking the time off is a psychological break as much as a physical one.
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Every public servant knows this already
Would change this to low level office job, if you have any level of responsibility then taking time off when it's less busy is less stressful.
LPT: Take time off when you feel like it.
PTO? Is this some American term again?
Lol. My girlfriend is a teacher. The only time we can take off together is during the quiet times when everyone else is with their kids.
So the advice is don't see family at the holiday?
terrible advice, like most shit on this sub
Having to save PTO? I've currently saved up to get away for three months...
I don't know anyone who lacks PTO. Is this LPT a regional thing?
Early career, that’s exactly what I did. As I earned more PTO, it became possible to have a summer decompress vacation, then just time to chill (even just 2, maybe 3 days) around holidays.
It can be pretty mind numbing to be at work with no one around. If you depend on other people to get stuff done, even more so.
If you have work you can do on your own, however, it’s a fantastic time to catch up / get ahead without distractions.
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LPT : Just take off whenever you wanna take off.
You're welcome.
LPT: Take time off when it suits you the most, if that's during the holidays to spend time with your family do that, if it's random Wednesdays just because do that.
Also watch out for official holidays and extended weekends. For example if a thursday is a paid holiday take friday off. Bam 4 days to do what you please!
My office has this lovely policy that if you work over the holidays you're responsible for covering for EVERYONE who took the time off. Out of 20 assistants only 5 are currently working between Xmas and NY, which means we have to cover EVERYONE's work as needed. Sure it's quieter...but I'm still responsible for my team of 5, my cubicle-mate's team of 5 (I always cover her vacation) AND anything else that anyone in the dept feels like sending my way.
Nope. Did this last year and got all the work because everybody was on leave. It depends on the industry and nature of your work
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This is completely dependent on what type of job/industry you work in. Until just a few weeks ago, I worked in the hospitality industry for resorts and hotels throughout the US for about 35 years. The period around Christmas and New Year’s Eve was always unofficially blacked out for PTO, because it’s one of the busiest times of the whole year. Just recently, I transitioned into education, working for a higher learning institution, and it’s the exact opposite- we follow the local county public school schedule, and everyone gets two weeks off paid at the end of the year. Quite a change after all that time as a rise and grinder
Only problem is when your boss won't let you do this.
Problem when I take time off during non holiday season is that I will have 200 unread emails and ad hoc requests in a week time frame
Where do you get the (incorrect) idea that “most” people use PTO during Christmas ?
I mean, Sure I'm working this week. But I'm in a large publicly traded company with an end of year target to hit.
But many of our customers are closed, and all of my friends who have office jobs have this week off. And I am very jealous. Though it may not be PTO, but rather company closures/holidays.
Paperworks is full no matter what date of the year
I usually save it to pepper between mid december and after new years to get a full 21 days off, airbnb my apartment, and fuck off to a tropical island with my buddies.
Hasn't failed me in the slightest thus far.
I have way too much vacation: no need to save it lol.
You learned this too late in your career?????? Every year our office is slow af
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For me it's the opposite. The amount of incoming work doesn't decrease so the people who don't take vacation during that time are stuck having to cover for the people who do.
I dunno, I enjoy taking time off when many others are, so I know I won’t have to come back to a pile of crap that I missed and then work to catch up.
Counterpoint: taking time off when your peers do not leads to tons of pressure upon return, and you’ll be generating crap for them to do during the holiday season.
Sync up your time off (if it works for you) and it’ll be a more stress-free experience for everyone.
mcgarnikle t1_j20grcq wrote
This is one that can be very dependent on work. I work at a library and we're dead on most holidays when kids don't have school and families are getting together.
My best friend is an accountant at a casino. They're forbidden from even asking for time off around holidays like New Years, normally they have mandatory overtime.
Still good advice if it applies to you.