How to Fill Out and Submit OPM Form 71: Request for Leave

OPM Form 71, the Request for Leave or Approved Absence, is the one-page form federal employees use to ask a supervisor for time off. You can download a fillable PDF from opm.gov or get a copy from your agency’s HR office.¹ It covers everything from a two-hour medical appointment to extended FMLA leave, and once your supervisor signs it, the form becomes the official record of the absence.

Filling Out the Form, Item by Item

The form fits on one page, but small errors will send it back. Work through it in order.

Items 1 Through 3: Who You Are

Item 1 asks for your name and your organization or agency. Item 2 asks for your employee number or, if your agency still uses Social Security Numbers, only the last four digits. Many agencies have shifted to employee IDs, so check with HR if you’re unsure which identifier belongs here.¹ Item 3 is for your timekeeper’s name or initials, if your agency uses one.

Dates, Times, and Total Hours

The middle of the form has rows for each day you’re requesting off. For each row, enter the date, the start time, the end time, and the total hours for that day. A full day on a standard schedule is eight hours. For a partial-day absence, enter only the hours you’ll actually be gone. Add the rows for the Total Hours line at the bottom, and double-check the math against your work schedule. A mismatch is the most common reason supervisors reject these forms.

Item 4: Type of Leave

Item 4 is a set of checkboxes. Pick the one that fits:¹

Accrued Annual Leave — from your existing annual balance.
Restored Annual Leave — leave that was forfeited in a prior year and later restored.
Advanced Annual Leave — annual leave granted before you’ve earned it.
Accrued Sick Leave — from your earned sick leave balance.
Advanced Sick Leave — sick leave granted before it’s earned, typically up to 30 days in serious cases.
Compensatory Time Off — time off earned in place of overtime pay.
Other Paid Absence — a catch-all for military leave, court leave, donor leave, and similar categories. Specify the type in Remarks.
Leave Without Pay (LWOP) — unpaid time off that keeps you on the rolls.

Check only one box. If a single absence spans two categories (you exhaust sick leave and the rest shifts to LWOP, for example), submit a separate form for each portion or explain the split in Remarks, depending on your agency’s practice.

Item 5: FMLA

If the absence qualifies under the Family and Medical Leave Act, use Item 5 to invoke that protection. Federal employees covered by Title II of the FMLA are entitled to up to 12 administrative workweeks in a 12-month period for the birth or placement of a child, a serious health condition of a spouse, child, or parent, or a serious health condition that prevents you from doing your job. FMLA isn’t a separate bank of hours; it’s a legal protection layered on top of whichever leave type you check in Item 4, and it can run concurrently with annual leave, sick leave, or LWOP. Federal employees may also be eligible for 12 weeks of paid parental leave in connection with a birth or placement.² If you’re relying on FMLA, check the box in Item 4 for the underlying leave type and the appropriate box in Item 5. Checking only one can leave you without the job protection you’re counting on.

Item 6: Purpose of Sick Leave

When you check Accrued or Advanced Sick Leave, the form asks why. Options include your own illness or incapacitation, a medical, dental, or optical exam, care for a family member (including bereavement), and care for a family member with a serious health condition.¹ Sick leave regulations also cover adoption-related absences, exposure to a communicable disease, and arranging care after a family member’s death.³

Remarks and Signature

Use Remarks to explain anything the checkboxes don’t capture: the specific type of Other Paid Absence, the reason for a retroactive request, a note that medical documentation will follow. Sign and date the form. Your signature acknowledges that you understand your agency’s leave procedures and that falsifying the form can lead to discipline up to and including removal.¹

Choosing the Right Leave Category

Picking the right box in Item 4 gets easier once you know what each category gives you and what it costs.

Annual Leave

Annual leave is your general-purpose paid time off. Accrual depends on tenure: employees with fewer than three years of service earn four hours per biweekly pay period (13 days a year), those between three and 15 years earn six hours per pay period (20 days), and those with 15 years or more earn eight hours per pay period (26 days). Senior Executive Service and equivalent positions earn eight hours per pay period regardless of tenure.⁴

Most employees stationed in the U.S. can carry a maximum of 30 days (240 hours) into the next leave year. Anything above that at year-end is use-or-lose and will be forfeited unless your agency restores it due to an exigency of service or other qualifying reason.⁴

Sick Leave

Sick leave accrues at four hours per pay period for all full-time employees, regardless of tenure, with no cap on accumulation. For absences of more than three days, your agency can require a medical certificate. You have 15 days from the agency’s request to provide it, or up to 30 days if you can show a good-faith effort and inability to get it sooner. Miss that window and you lose the sick leave entitlement for those days.⁵

Compensatory Time Off

If you worked overtime and took comp time instead of overtime pay, you redeem it here. The deadline matters: you must use compensatory time by the end of the 26th pay period after the pay period in which you earned it. After that, your agency may pay it out or forfeit it depending on internal policy. If the agency prevented you from using the time because of workload, it must pay you instead.⁶

Leave Without Pay

LWOP is unpaid time off. In most situations, granting it is at your supervisor’s discretion and may be limited by agency policy.⁷ The regulations don’t set a fixed maximum, but if your total nonpay status in a calendar year exceeds six months, the excess time no longer counts as creditable service for annual leave accrual and retirement, and your service computation date is pushed back accordingly.⁸

Military, Donor, and Court Leave

None of these have a dedicated checkbox. All three go under Other Paid Absence, with the type written in Remarks.

Reservists and National Guard members earn 20 days of paid military leave per fiscal year. Unused days carry over but cannot exceed 20 days at the start of a new fiscal year.⁹ Attach a copy of your orders.

Donor leave is a separate paid entitlement on top of annual and sick leave: up to seven days per calendar year for bone-marrow donation and up to 30 days per calendar year for organ donation.¹⁰

Court leave is paid time off when you’re summoned for jury duty or called as a witness in a proceeding where a federal, state, or local government is a party. Any jury or witness fees you receive (not counting reimbursements for transportation and similar expenses) must be turned over to your agency.¹¹

Submitting the Form

Once Items 1 through 7 are complete and signed, send the form to your immediate supervisor through whatever channel your agency uses. Some offices still route paper; many use digital time-and-attendance systems where you upload the form or enter the request in a portal that generates the electronic equivalent. The form itself defers to each agency’s procedures, so if you’re not sure whether to hand-deliver, email, or file digitally, ask your timekeeper.¹

For planned absences, submit as far in advance as your agency requires. The form doesn’t set an advance-notice period; that’s an internal policy question. For unplanned absences like a sudden illness, notify your supervisor as soon as you can and file the form retroactively when you’re back. Use Remarks to explain why the request is coming after the fact.

What Happens After You Submit

Your supervisor completes Item 8, the Official Action section, by checking Approved or Disapproved. A denial requires a written reason in Item 8b.¹ For annual leave, a disapproval triggers an obligation to work with you to reschedule rather than simply reject the time off.

Once approved, the form goes to payroll or timekeeping. Approved hours come off the relevant balance, and pay is adjusted if any portion is LWOP. The signed form becomes the official record of the authorized absence, and your agency retains it well after the fact.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

Check your leave balance before submitting. Requesting more annual leave than you’ve accrued forces your supervisor to either deny the request or convert the excess to advanced leave or LWOP, which you may not want.

If you’re taking sick leave for more than three consecutive workdays, line up medical documentation early so you can meet the 15-day window once your agency asks.⁵

Watch year-end deadlines. If you’re anywhere near the 240-hour annual leave ceiling, schedule leave well before the final pay period so you don’t forfeit hours.⁴ The same applies to compensatory time approaching its 26-pay-period expiration.⁶

And when FMLA is in play, check both Item 4 and Item 5. One box alone is not enough.

1
U.S. Office of Personnel Management. OPM Form 71 – Request for Leave or Approved Absence
2
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 5 USC 6382 – Leave Requirement
3
eCFR. 5 CFR Part 630 Subpart D – Sick Leave
4
U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Fact Sheet: Annual Leave
5
U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Fact Sheet: Personal Sick Leave
6
eCFR. 5 CFR 550.114 – Compensatory Time Off
7
U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Fact Sheet: Leave Without Pay
8
U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Effect of Extended Leave Without Pay (LWOP) on Federal Benefits and Programs
9
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 5 USC 6323 – Military Leave
10
U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Fact Sheet: Bone Marrow or Organ Donor Leave
11
U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Fact Sheet: Court Leave