My question involves employment and labor law for the state of: Mississippi
Ok, long story short. I work for a large US retail corporation and last year they changed the vacation benefits policy. On the old policy, an hourly employee would accrue vacation hours weekly according to how many hours they worked. On the new policy, the company front loads a set amount of hours at the beginning of the year based upon full time or part time status. So basically, we get less vacation hours since we get a set amount which doesn't account for overtime for full time employees or working over 20 hours for part time employees.
Recently, I found new employment that starts in approx. 60 days. I have not notified or let anyone at work know that I'm leaving. I have used almost all of my 3 weeks vacation time already and never anticipated any problems. However, another employee just turned in their 2 week notice and wanted to use some vacation time and was told that the vacation time is now front loaded at the beginning of the year and hasn't been earned yet, and that any vacation time used would be deducted from their last paycheck. None of this was told to the employees in the HR meeting about the new policies last year.
Now, since I have used almost all of my vacation time up and I am moving on to another job. Can they keep my last check? What if I don't give them notice and just start my new job after my last check direct deposits? If I did that, could my employer "somehow" withdraw funds from my direct deposit account? Would they have any legal recourse against me if I just quit after my last check was deposited? Since they give me and let me use my vacation hours up front, should I have a reasonable expectation to be able to use them without owing them back?

