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IV. Maternity Leave State Law
If you are getting a bit discouraged after learning about FMLA, either because you or your employer don’t qualify or you were hoping for paid leave, don’t have a breakdown just yet! Individual state laws may help. In addition to the federal laws discussed above (PDA and FMLA), you should also take a look at the laws of your own home state. A number of states have their own family leave statutes.
FMLA applies to all states but nothing in FMLA supersedes or overrides a more beneficial provision of state law. Your employer, if it is covered by both federal and state leave laws, must comply with whichever law is more beneficial to you, the employee.
The U.S. Department of Labor will not enforce state family and medical leave laws though, and state agencies may not enforce FMLA. So if you’ve got a complaint, you may need to lodge it in more than one place in order to cover all the bases. You have no obligation to designate whether the leave you are taking is FMLA leave as opposed to leave under state law.
When you begin investigating the leave laws and your company’s leave policy, you should check with your state labor agency about pregnancy laws in your state in addition to speaking with your employer’s human resources department.
In both inquiries, you should ask:
• how long your leave can be under company policy and under state law
• whether or not the leave must be paid under company policy and under state law
• what notice requirements are included in company policy and state law
• are there “light duty” provisions in state law or company policy
• is pregnancy treated as a disability under state law for short term disability payment purposes or under the provisions of your private short term disability insurance coverage (more on the short term disability subject later in this text)
• whether the state law prohibits discrimination against pregnant employees in the workplace
• what the state law says regarding reinstating pregnant employees – can you be assured that you’ll get your job back?
At the conclusion of this text, we have prepared a detailed Appendix containing the basic information about the provisions of FMLA and similar statutes that have been enacted by individual states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. Be sure to check the Appendix for the laws applicable in your own state.
Proceed to - Maternity Leave State Law
FMLA applies to all states but nothing in FMLA supersedes or overrides a more beneficial provision of state law. Your employer, if it is covered by both federal and state leave laws, must comply with whichever law is more beneficial to you, the employee.
The U.S. Department of Labor will not enforce state family and medical leave laws though, and state agencies may not enforce FMLA. So if you’ve got a complaint, you may need to lodge it in more than one place in order to cover all the bases. You have no obligation to designate whether the leave you are taking is FMLA leave as opposed to leave under state law.
When you begin investigating the leave laws and your company’s leave policy, you should check with your state labor agency about pregnancy laws in your state in addition to speaking with your employer’s human resources department.
In both inquiries, you should ask:
• how long your leave can be under company policy and under state law
• whether or not the leave must be paid under company policy and under state law
• what notice requirements are included in company policy and state law
• are there “light duty” provisions in state law or company policy
• is pregnancy treated as a disability under state law for short term disability payment purposes or under the provisions of your private short term disability insurance coverage (more on the short term disability subject later in this text)
• whether the state law prohibits discrimination against pregnant employees in the workplace
• what the state law says regarding reinstating pregnant employees – can you be assured that you’ll get your job back?
At the conclusion of this text, we have prepared a detailed Appendix containing the basic information about the provisions of FMLA and similar statutes that have been enacted by individual states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. Be sure to check the Appendix for the laws applicable in your own state.
Proceed to - Maternity Leave State Law
