PBS Question, "Prefer off Weekends"
 

Can't find the answer on the NAVBLUE Help tab. What does this mean, just Sat, Sun? If I manually preference 4 different Fri-Sun, then follow up with Prefer Off Weekends, does that give me the best shot at getting all 4 weekends off? I'm #19 in category. Thanks

It attempts to get you every Saturday and Sunday off that’s within the bid period.

Check page 71 of the PBS Reference Handbook. Yes, just Saturday and Sunday off (midnight to midnight), and must have both off to award it to you. Will give you as many weekends off as possible.

I wouldn't bother with both. If you order the weekends in order of preference from most desired to least then you're covered. Adding the Prefer Off Weekends line does nothing for you. By the time the combobulator gets to that line it's already tried to give you every Fri-Sun off that it could.

The only use I could see for Prefer Off Weekends is if having a day trip dropped on a Saturday or having to start on Sunday/end on Friday is a deal breaker for you. But putting All or Nothing on each line of your Fri-Sun bids should fix that.

Another important misconception about Prefer Off weekends, it does NOT (as another poster stated) try to give you as many weekends as possible. The language in PBS is a misnomer i.e. “Prefer Off weekends minimum 4” means that PBS will attempt to give you 4 weekends off and 4 weekends only.

I prefer using Prefer off Saturday and Prefer off Sunday, and even then I only use it for my default bid.

Just remember that doing this, PBS will prioritize the day chronologically. For example, prefer-off Saturday will try to award the 1st Sat of the month first, then the 2nd, etc...

To the OP, if you're 17 in category, just request off the days you want, you'll like get them. As a backup, you could add prefer off weekends...heed the advice of putting a min of X if you want more than 1 weekend off. If you just put prefer off weekends, if PBS awards you just one weekend off, it will be honored.

That’s if you’re using the Minimum function. The first paragraph of page 71 says, “PBS must give you a combined Saturday and Sunday off to honor a Weekend Off, and will award as many as possible complete weekends off, including weekends in the following bid period.”

The misnomer occurs when you use the Minimum function, as is explained in the third paragraph on page 71. Using that function will ONLY give you as many weekends off as you have set as the minimum. If you don’t use that function, it will try to give you as many as possible off.

Unless I’m reading all of that incorrectly...

I’m taking the early out and most likely will be out the door September 1. My primary vacation starts August 30 so one day falls in the Aug bid period. If I bid reserve for Aug Is there a smart way to maximize the retirement vaca payout? Thanks

You can't move days of vacation out of the bid period.

Thanks Ted