Coordinating employee leaves under the various leave laws can prove to be a challenge for employers. To ensure compliance, employers should familiarize themselves with the requirements for all applicable leave laws and establish policies and procedures for handling employee leave requests. Importantly, employers should administer those policies and procedures in a consistent and nondiscriminatory manner, in order to avoid legal claims and risk.
Compliance Tips
Administering employee leave can be a complex and confusing process. Employers should consider the following compliance tips when managing employee leaves:
- Familiarize yourself with leave laws and follow recent developments.
- Establish written and inclusive policies
Policies need to be thoroughly outlined to clearly clarify eligibility and qualification for taking leave. Documentation needs to be inclusive so that no one is left out, which in turn, not only minimizes risk of potential for discrimination but also makes your organization a better place to work overall by conveying the message that employee care benefits are available to everyone.
- Administer the employer’s leave policies in a consistent and nondiscriminatory manner across the organization. Maintaining this type of consistency can help protect an employer from claims of illegal leave administration, including claims of retaliation or discrimination.
- Provide proper training for any managers or supervisors who are involved in the employee leave process and on the employer’s leave policies. This will help ensure that employee leaves are administered in a manner that is consistent with applicable laws and in a consistent and non-discriminatory way. Be sure that managers have adequate knowledge on the current legal rights of employees when it comes to taking a leave of absence. Managers need to be trained regularly to ensure compliance.
- Determine which employee leave laws and policies may apply to an employee’s leave request. Employers may need to review an individual employee’s specific situation to determine what their leave obligations and entitlements are. Employees are not always clear about why they need to take leave and may not cooperate with the employer’s leave process. However, despite these obstacles, the employee may still have leave rights under the law.
- If an employee’s leave is covered under more than one leave law or policy, determine if the leave periods can run concurrently in order to reduce the amount of time off. For example, when an employee takes a workers’ compensation leave due to a workplace injury, an employer should consider counting this leave against the employee’s FMLA entitlement.
- Track employee leave. Businesses should track how employees use their leave and figure out how to manage unused sick leave time. Employers are obligated to track employee sick leave, keeping employees updated about their balance and keeping their sick leave records for three years. There are many types of leave tracking software available.
- Continue group health plan benefits during the leave, if required to do so by the employee leave law or employer policy.
- Be supportive. Taking an empathetic approach to leave management have seen improved rates of employee retention and overall workplace satisfaction.
It is imperative that employers keep on top of current requirements and continue to update their policies, as needed. Leave entitlement must also be clearly communicated to employees. Please contact Ali Law Group should you need any assistance in complying with or administering leave laws for your business. We are here to help you navigate through this complex and confusing process.