Actually, the way that is written means exactly what the employer did: cutting off the PTO period at the anniversary of your date of hire. “Year of employment” means just that, each year you have been employed, and that year starts with the day you were hired. If you get hired on Nov 1, then Dec 31 is not a year of employment; it is just two months of employment. Had the employer meant instead fiscal year or calendar year the policy would have said just that. You assumed it was a calendar year because that was your experience with other companies. But it is a mistake to assume that all employers do things the same way, although I see people make that very mistake all the time.

