Off-Topic

* This is NOT legal advice. *

Just some google searching:

From the link above:

Unused vacation time is a "wage" under Maryland law and must be paid to departing employees regardless of the employer's policy, Maryland's Labor Department has ruled. The agency responsible for administering Maryland's wage and hour laws has quietly reversed its longstanding position on an employee's right to payment of unused vacation at termination. The Employment Standards Service of the Maryland Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation (DLLR) previously maintained that employees had no right to payment for accrued, unused vacation at termination, so long as their employers' policy clearly denied them such a right.

I've never used them, but I have about 4 Jackson Lewis "All we do is work" caps that I wear while working out or doing yardwork. Kudos to whoever came up with that slogan for them. Very catchy.

This post should not be construed as legal advice. Or even as being remotely helpful.

You accrued an entire year's salary worth of vacation time?

File a claim with Maryland Wage Hour Administration. I believe the burden is on the employer to say why this payment could not be paid. BTW, I would ask for a copy of the handbook you never got (usually these handbooks are pseudocontract, so you sign for them when you get them.) Still if the policy is that terminated employees are not entitled to accrued vacation (by that I mean vacation you could not take the day you left employment but which was accruing for the upcoming vacation year), you are out of luck. You not getting the handbook is not going to help you in that case, unless the Handbook is poorly written or fails to outline the policies (the writer of the contract is held responsible for errors and vagaries). At that point you are going to have to prove others in a similar set of circumstances as yours, did get accrued vacation. If you could have taken paid days off, that is not accruing, but earned. In that case they must pay, and wage hour will sue them for you!

29 years in HR, and not a lawyer, but I handled dozens of these cases over the years, and that is how they played out.

Remember "unused" vacation is very different from "accruing" vacation for the next vacation year.

Sounds like they have a "use it or lose it" vacation policy. We make our employees sign a document that they got the handbook. If you signed it, you are screwed. If you didn't, I would continue your pursuit, but not sure how it will end. You may end up spending $6000 with a lawyer to get your $6800.

FWIW, the excerpt that Kunal quoted above says the exact opposite. The MD Labor Board apparently recently reversed itself on that question.