Articles Discussing The FMLA Regulations.

A funny thing happened as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Employers everywhere sent their employees home to work, many of whom will work forever more out of their home or remote worksite, never to see the Company headquarters again.

Coming out of the pandemic, some employers have drastically scaled

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit recently held that an employer may challenge an employee’s entitlement to the benefits of the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) without the necessity of obtaining a second medical opinion. Employers in the Ninth Circuit may, in certain circumstances, rely on

Your employee, Johnny, is one of your poor performers. Upon receiving his latest written warning, he requests a leave of absence due to anxiety from working in a hostile work environment.

Tell me you’ve seen this one before.

Apparently, Johnny’s boss was guilty of being too direct.

The

The Wage and Hour Division of the Department of Labor (DOL) has advised in an opinion letter on calculating Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) leave when employees take off part of a week during which a holiday falls that holidays are not counted toward leave, unless an employee takes the entire week off or the employee was scheduled to work on the holiday.

Welcome to the two people willing to dive into this blog post after reading that riveting headline!

In a highly technical opinion letter issued this week, the Department of Labor clarified how to calculate FMLA leave usage when an employee takes intermittent leave during a holiday week.

Bear with

Every one of us in the HR/employment world has met this moment. Your employee, Tommy, hands you a doctor’s note – usually no more than one sentence long – stating simply:

Tommy’s pinky toe hurts. Based on my medical judgment, Tommy cannot work more than 8 hours in a

Everyone one of us has been there.

Your employee, Johnny, takes a leave of absence because he stubbed his toe at work, resulting in a lengthy worker’s compensation absence.  For one reason or another, Johnny’s one week leave of absence turns into one month, then six months.

One night, right

This one is to get the blood flowing for you hard-core FMLA nerds out there, cause it’s quickly going to get in the leave of absence weeds.

With the Labor Day holiday approaching, let’s discuss how an employer should calculate FMLA leave during a holiday week. Before you blurt out,

On June 17, 2021, the U.S. District Court for the District of Oregon issued an opinion and order in Munger v. Cascade Steel Rolling Mills, Inc., addressing an employee’s claims under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) and an analogous state law after the employee’s separation from employment due

While nearly all of you are reading up on the CDC’s latest guidance allowing vaccinated folks to shed their masks inside and out, we’re getting back to the basics here on the FMLA Insights blog.

A few of my clients have been grappling with how and when an employee recoups

Tony, an employee for a medical clinic, tested positive for COVID-19. At the advice of his physician, Tony is required to quarantine for 14 days. Because he is completely asymptomatic, however, Tony scheduled no visit with his doctor, and no regimen of continuing treatment was prescribed.

Assuming Tony cannot perform

On September 10, 2019, the Department of Labor (DOL) released a Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) Opinion Letter, FMLA2019-3-A, reinforcing the DOL’s position set out in an earlier opinion letter that “an employer is prohibited from delaying the designation of FMLA-qualifying leave as FMLA leave.” WHD Opinion Letter FMLA2019-1-A, 2019 WL 1514982 (Mar. 14, 2019). The September letter reiterates that an employer may not delay designating paid leave as FMLA leave, even if the delay complies with a collective bargaining agreement (CBA) and the employee prefers that the FMLA designation be delayed.

Granting summary judgment to an employer on Family and Medical Leave Act claims asserted by a former employee, an Illinois district court held that: (1) the employee had failed to demonstrate his firing had any causal relationship to his prior FMLA leave (or any potential future need for FMLA leave); and (2) the employer’s initial denial of FMLA leave was justified based on the plaintiff’s failure to provide sufficient medical documentation justifying his wife’s “serious health condition.” Davidson v. Evergreen Park Community High School District 231, No. 15 C 0039, 2017 U.S. LEXIS 77724 (N.D. Ill. May 23, 2017).

I love my brother dearly. I love my sister just as much.

I recently had an interesting call with a DOL investigator, and I wanted to share it with you.