President Declares Dec. 24 Federal Holiday Published Dec. 21, 2012 WESTOVER AIR RESERVE BASE, Mass. -- Team Westover, President Obama issued an executive Order on 21 December 2012 to close Federal offices and excuse Federal employees from duty on 24 December 2012. The Executive Order permits the head of the agency (i.e. Department of Defense) to exempt those offices from closure if certain employees cannot be excused for reasons of national security, defense or other essential public business. Therefore, only those Air Force employees previously designated as "essential" will be required to work. For pay and leave purposes this day will fall under the rules governing holidays. Most employees will simply receive their basic pay for this day. Previously scheduled leave, comp time or credit hours will not be charged on 24 December 2012. This does not apply to those personnel receiving premium pay for standby duty or to firefighters covered by special pay provisions. Timekeepers are asked to code timesheets as "LH" for payroll reporting purposes. Please note if an employee has scheduled use or lose annual leave for 24 December 2012 and is unable to reschedule the leave for use prior to the end of the leave year, 12 January 2013, the leave will be forfeited. When use or lose leave is forfeited under these conditions, there is no authority that permits restoration of the leave. For essential employees who cannot be excused on 24 December 2012 for reasons of national security, defense or other essential public business, those employees are entitled to holiday premium pay under 5 USC 5546 (B) for non-overtime hours. Timekeepers should post in DCPS as an exception: code HG for GS employees, code HF for 1st shift WG employees and HT for 3rd shift WG employees. These codes apply only to the hours worked by an essential employee who was not excused on 24 December 2012 for reasons stated in this paragraph. When a holiday falls on a non-workday for an employee with a compressed work schedule or for an employee whose basic work schedule does not include the holiday; the employee's "in lieu of" holiday is the basic workday immediately preceding the non-workday. Additional information may be found at the following Office of Personnel Management link: http://www.chcoc.gov/transmittals/TransmittalDetails.aspx?TransmittalID=5212 Please feel free to contact the Civilian Personnel Office at 557-3193 with any questions or concerns.