Yes! One of the Biggest Perks of Traveling is having control over when you work, and when you don't
Once your contract ends, you can decide when you’re ready for your next opportunity. For some healthcare professionals, that might mean taking a week to unpack and reset. For others, it could mean spending a month at home with your family taking a long-awaited vacation or taking extra time to find your next position. That flexibility is a big part of what makes travel contracts different from a traditional staff position. Your career can have some breathing room built into it, instead of every vacation or life event having to fit around your employer’s PTO policy. Of course, taking time off also means planning for the practical side of it. Here’s what to know before you put your next assignment on pause.
How Much Time Can you Take off Between Travel Assignments?
You can take as much time as you want between travel assignments, but your time off may affect your benefit selections. If you’ve opted into benefits through your travel agency, taking an extended break between contracts could impact your eligibility or coverage. Be sure to review the details of your benefits before deciding how much time to take off. Once you understand how your benefits may be affected, you can choose a schedule that works for your finances, priorities, and lifestyle. Travel contracts are often around 13 weeks, so you may have opportunities throughout the year to take time off, whether that’s a few days to get settled, a week to decompress, a couple of weeks at home or a longer vacation. The flexibility is there; just make sure you understand how your time between contracts could affect your benefits before making plans.
Do you get paid during time between contracts?
Travel Contracts have a beginning and ending date that typically correlate with their first day on the job and their last day. So, while you may qualify for travel reimbursements, your next contract frequently doesn’t start until your first day on the new assignment, this nuance makes financial planning especially important if you want to take longer breaks. Plan ahead between assignments if you want to take a longer break, take a look at your savings, your monthly expenses and any plans for the time you’ll be off. Remember to account for things like housing, health insurance, travel costs and other expenses that may not stop just because your contract does. If a month at home with your family or a two-week trip you've been dreaming about is a priority, you can build that into your financial plan instead of treating it like something you have to squeeze in later.
Why Take time off Between Assignments?
The time between contracts can be as meaningful, relaxing or adventurous as you want it to be.
spend more time with the people you miss
Traveling for work can be an incredible experience, but it can also mean being away from the people you care about. A break between contracts gives you the chance to actually be home for a meaningful period of uninterrupted time. You can have dinner with your parents. Spend a weekend with your best friends. Help your sister move. See your nieces and nephews. Or just enjoy your hometown for a while.
plan for a real vacation in a far away place
Your time between travel contracts can also give you the freedom to take the trip you’ve been putting off. Maybe you want to plan a cross-country road trip, spend a few weeks exploring another country or take an extended vacation without trying to squeeze everything into a long weekend. With the flexibility to choose when you start your next contract, you can build bigger adventures into your year—not just fit travel into your days off.
give yourself a reset
There’s a lot that goes into changing assignments. You might be moving to a new city, starting at a new facility, meeting an entirely new team and learning a new routine. Doing that back-to-back without any breathing room can get exhausting if you met any extra challenges along the way. Taking even a little time between contracts can give you a chance to unpack, catch your breath and mentally close out your previous assignment before starting the next one. You don’t have to spend your break doing something productive, either. Sometimes the most productive thing you can do is absolutely nothing.
How Do you Plan for Time Between Contracts?
The easiest way to make time off enjoyable is to plan for it before you need it. If you know you want to take a few weeks off after your next assignment, start thinking about that when you’re choosing the contract. Look at when the assignment ends, what you want to do afterward and how much money you’ll want set aside to cover the gap. You always want to update your recruiter if you want time off between – and how much time. If you know you want to spend a month at your parents before your next assignment, they can keep that in mind when helping you search for opportunities. You don't have to know exactly what your entire year will look like. That's kind of the point. You might work for a few months, spend some time at home, take a trip, head somewhere new and then decide what sounds good from there. Your career doesn’t have to run on the same schedule every year.
Make Your Career Work Around Your Life
One of the most appealing parts of travel healthcare is that your career can have some flexibility built into it. You can work toward professional and financial goals while still making room for the things that matter outside of work. Maybe that means some meaningful volunteer work. Maybe it means more time with certain people. Maybe it means taking breaks when you want them, not just when you need them. There’s no single “right” way to structure a healthcare career in travel. Work hard. Take a break. Go somewhere. See something new. Start another assignment when you’re ready. That freedom to decide what comes next is one of the reasons so many healthcare professionals choose to travel in the first place.
