Articles Posted in Family and Medical Leave

In that handbook of yours should be a page — maybe a few lines — on an employee’s responsibility to notify you if they are going to miss work. Who to call, when to call, that kind of stuff.

A recent case from the Sixth Circuit (this one) reaffirms that employees need not relax these rules — even when the employee is seeking leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act.

In White v. Dana Light Axle Manuf., the employer had a simple rule: when you’re going to be out, call it in. The plaintiff, who needed FMLA leave for a hernia surgery, assumed that because he had previously met with the employer in person to discuss his upcoming hernia surgery, he didn’t need to later call in his absences.

Do you have 50 or more employees working with 75 miles of one another?

If not, see ya Monday.

But if you do, check out the United States Department of Labor’s revised “Fact Sheet #28F: Qualifying Reasons for Leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act.”

Senator Richard Durbin [IL-D] has reintroduced the Family and Medical Leave Inclusion Act in the U.S. Senate, while Rep. Carolyn Maloney [D-NY12] has done the same in the U.S. House of Representatives. This bill, which has been taken up in Congress several times previously — most recently in 2011 — would amend the Family and Medical Leave Act to permit leave to care for a same-sex spouse, domestic partner, parent-in-law, adult child, sibling, grandchild, or grandparent who has a serious health condition.

I’d be surprised if the FMLIA becomes law. However, regardless of whether it passes, there is nothing now preventing employers from offering these benefits to their employees.

Did someone say benefits? Well friends, do I have some benefits for you! (See how I did that?)

“Damn you, Department of Labor! It’s 12:00:01 on March 8, 2013. I keep refreshing this stupid site and nothing is happening! I NEED FORMS!!!!”

— Absolutely no one in HR.

Actually, the forms have been available for some time now, slacker.

Under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), employees are eligible for leave if they have worked for their employer at least 12 months, at least 1,250 hours over the past 12 months, and work at a location where the company employs 50 or more employees within 75 miles.

Consequently, part-time employees generally do not qualify for FMLA leave because they do not meet the 1,250-hour requirement.

However, a new bill introduced last month in the U.S. House of Representatives would change that if signed into law. It’s called the Part-Time Worker Bill of Rights Act of 2013 and you can download a copy of it here.

Yesterday, we addressed (here) the possibility of Congress taking up paid sick leave shortly.

Now, there is word that the Parental Bereavement Act, last considered in 2011 as an amendment to the Family and Medical Leave Act, is back on the table.

Last week, in this press release, Senator Jon Tester (D-MT), announced that he and and Congressman Steve Israel (D-N.Y.) will champion the effort to change the FMLA to allow  parents grieving from the death of their son or daughter to receive up to 12 weeks of job-protected time-off.

Coming soon, so says Senator Tom Harkin here.

Known as the “Healthy Families Act,” this bill was introduced in the House in 2009, and again in both the House and Senate in 2011, but never got much traction.

But now, in addition to Senator Harkin, former President Bill Clinton is stumping for paid FMLA.

Image Credit: Pixabay.com

I have three kids, ages three and under. So a vacation for me is the half hour of quiet time I get in the bathroom every morning.

It’s not like the old days.

I remember Spring Break ’97 in the Bahamas. Sun, beach, water sports, and a couple of adult beverages.

It was kinda like the Mexican vacation that Carol Lineberry, a former employee of Detroit Medical Center, took back in 2011. These pictures she posted on Facebook — we didn’t have Facebook back in the day, so I’ll deny everything. EVERYTHING! — show that Ms. Lineberry is having a blast in Mexico.

Did I mention that Lineberry took this trip while taking leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act? Of course, she did. And now she’s on The Employer Handbook.

See how that works? Like a Zoolander gasoline fight, trust me, this won’t end well for Lineberry. No, it won’t.

Read more after the jump…

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Before going any further, allow me to wish a Happy Belated 20th Birthday to the Family and Medical Leave Act.

What can I say? I plumb forgot. To atone, I got Fammy Med a Walkman. (Kids, that’s what we used to listen to music in 1993. It doesn’t walk and it’s not a man. But it did play my mix tapes — sigh).

Next year, to celebrate the big 2-1, drinks are on me. Sizzurpbombs! Remy Martin Cognac Louis XIII.