The FMLA

• Under the law, companies with more than 50 employees are required to grant at least 12 weeks of leave in a 12-month period to employees for the birth or adoption of a child, the care of a family member with a serious health condition or the care of the employee for a serious health condition. The leave does not have to be paid, but employers can exhaust all paid leave first while the employee is out. Employers are required to reinstate covered employee to the same position level and same health care benefits when they return. To invoke their rights to use FMLA, employees must submit a certificate of need that specifies the medical or other qualifying event. The appropriate human resources or management level party must provide a written response within five days. The law says that eligible employees are those who have been on the job for 12 months and has worked for 1,250 or more hours. Employees do not have to take the 12 weeks all at once, nor do their 1,250 hours have to be consecutive.
  
  

Military & Same-Sex Families

• Protections have been added for those in the military and their families and coverage has expanded to include nontraditional families. For military families, FMLA amendments now give 26 weeks of unpaid leave if you have to take care of someone who is kin to someone in the military. For example, if a military person went to war and came back injured and needs additional help. In addition, military families are allowed 12 weeks off for "qualifying exigencies" related to military deployment. This means they are allotted time off to make child-care arrangements, handle finances and tend to other issues ahead of their service member's leaving.
  
  

Prohibited Acts

• Employers cannot base their hiring decisions on their estimation of a potential employee's need to use FMLA. They cannot count FMLA time off against employees for attendance awards or for bonuses that are not related to performance. If the employee is using FMLA intermittently, the supervisor cannot require a doctor's note for each absence if the leave has already been precertified and approved by the employer. Employers also cannot retaliate against employees who make complaints about the way the company runs the FMLA program.
  
  

Special Circumstances

• If two parents work for the same company, they are entitled to a combined total of 12 weeks, which they may choose to take at different times. Newer regulations are being formulated for flight crews who operate by different hours; a separate set of hours required to meet eligibility criteria for FMLA for people in this industry has been established by the Department of Labor. Generally speaking, a flight crew member is eligible if he has worked or been paid 60 percent of his total monthly guarantee in the past 12 months and he has worked at least 504 hours, not counting commuting.
  
  

Non-Compliance

• The U.S. Department of Labor's Wage and Hour Division investigates complaints about a company's handling of FMLA. If mediation is not successful, the Labor Department can take a company to court to force it to comply with the provisions of the law. Individuals also have the right to sue their employers over FMLA matters.