Practical HR Tips, News & Advice. Updated Daily.
Question: We have an employee who took four days off to tend to his daughter in the hospital after she received a C-section and another who wants to take three weeks off to assist her sibling going through chemotherapy. Would the absences in both scenarios fall under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA)? Answer: […]
We occasionally hear from clients asking if their employees have to be employed for 12 months and work 1,250 hours to qualify for the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA) or if they qualify as soon as they begin employment. The question appears to conflate aspects of the PWFA with a similar but distinct federal labor […]
Question: Would it be noncompliant to require employees to work both the day before and the day after a holiday to receive holiday pay? Also, would it break any pay laws not to provide holiday pay to an employee who calls out sick before a holiday? Answer: Although holiday pay is a common benefit employers provide, […]
Question: We have an employee who is undergoing fertility treatments out of town and misses days sporadically. Do these absences fall under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA)? Answer: Great question; complicated answer. The answer is complicated because a question about FMLA leave is always the start of a longer conversation about whether other […]
Question: If an employee takes Family Medical and Leave Act (FMLA) leave to bond with his new child, would he be able to take additional bonding time later the same year if he still had FMLA time available? Answer: The FMLA has some restrictions on when an employee can take leave for birth or bonding […]
Question: One of our employees has been in and out with cold and flu symptoms, but he was recently diagnosed with strep throat. The leave originally wasn’t classified as Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) leave, but because the official diagnosis occurred almost a month after the first missed workday, does the time he took off […]
An employee’s performance is measured by the amount of work done. Fair enough. The employee takes Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) leave. Must the metrics of performance measurement be adjusted as a result? Earlier this year, by a 2-to-1 vote, a federal appeals court gave an emphatic “yes” in response. High-Pressure Job Marianne Wayland […]
Most employers are generally aware that federal and state laws protect employees from adverse employment actions because of pregnancy, including Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), and, potentially, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Employers should also be aware of and follow the Pregnant Workers […]
Question: One of our employees is on intermittent Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) leave. She’s gotten sick and claims it’s unrelated to her reasons for being on FMLA leave. Can we include these days in her FMLA time and have them go unpaid? Answer: No. Unless you have reason to believe she’s being untruthful, […]
Here’s a tale from the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals (whose rulings apply to all Texas employers), which told a Texas trial court that it erred in dismissing a Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) retaliation lawsuit against the city of Granbury. In deconstructing the appeals court’s opinion, we see how judges—like each and […]