Covered employers

If you employ 50 or more employees, you are covered by the federal Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA).

If you employ five or more employees, you are covered by the California Family Rights Act (CFRA).

Maximum amount of leave

FMLA provides a maximum of 12 weeks of leave in a 12-month period.

FMLA also provides 26 weeks of leave for an employee who is the spouse, son, daughter, parent or next of kin for a covered military servicemember who requires care.

CFRA provides a maximum of 12 weeks of leave in a 12-month period.

Employee eligibility

Employees are eligible if employed at a worksite with 50 or more employees in a 75-mile radius. Eligible employees must also have worked for you for 12 months (need not be consecutive) and 1,250 hours in the 12 months prior to the need for leave.

Employees are eligible if they have worked for you for 12 months and 1,250 hours in a 12-month period.

Reasons for leave

An employee can use FMLA in the following circumstances:

• The employee's own serious health condition.
• Caring for a family member (parent, child, spouse) with a serious health condition.
• Bonding with a newborn, an adopted child or a child placed in foster care with an employee.
• Pregnancy-related disability.
• A qualifying exigency relating to a close family member's military service.
• Up to 26 weeks per 12-month period to care for an ill or injured service- member.

An employee can use CFRA in the following circumstances:

• The employee's own serious health condition.
• Caring for a family member (parent, child, grandparent, grandchild, sibling, spouse, registered domestic partner, parent-in-law, or a "designated person") with a serious health condition.
• Bonding with a newborn, an adopted child or a child placed in foster care with an employee.
• A qualifying exigency relating to a close family member's military service.

Employer responsibilities

When you learn that an employee is absent for any reason that may qualify as FMLA/CFRA, you should send a notice to the employee designating any time off related to the absence as FMLA/CFRA.

There are also requirements for posters and notices, including notices relating to eligibility.

Employers are prohibited from interfering with the exercise of FMLA/CFRA rights and from retaliating against an employee who takes FMLA/CFRA.

Employers must return employees to the same or a comparable position when the leave ends.

Ending the employment relationship before the leave expires

For both FMLA and CFRA, the employee has a right to reinstatement. However, the employee has no greater rights than if the employee were not out on leave. The right to reinstatement would end if the employment relationship ends.

However, employees on FMLA/CFRA are protected from retaliation for taking leave.

Consult legal counsel before you terminate an employee on FMLA/CFRA.