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Medical Leave Policies

We are a small agency (about 20) in North Texas and are in the process of reviewing our medical leave and maternity/paternity leave benefits. We are interested to know what your policy is on these benefits ¾ length of leave available, paid and/or unpaid leave, etc. It would be helpful to also know the size and location of your agency.

Marilyn Power
Operations Director
Stuart Bacon

We are head quartered in Louisville, Kentucky with an office in Indianapolis and South Bend, Indiana. We have 39 employees. We give three weeks paid disability. This includes maternity leave. If additional time is needed off the employee can choose days with no pay or may use their vacation and/or personal days.

Lynnette Kokomooor
CFO
Bandy Carroll Hellige Adv

We are an agency too of about 20. We fund maternity leave with short-term disability insurance, in which the typical maternity leave is 6 weeks. The employee gets 70% of their weekly pay (after the 8th day of sickness) up to a max. of $1,000 weekly. Should a physician feel the employee needs a longer maternity leave, then the employe would get something in writing from their physician. Any time beyond 6 weeks (since we not subject to Family Medical Leave Act), would be unpaid. We are now reviewing this unpaid time to determine if this time should be 8 weeks or longer.

Anna Parisi
GBL

Our handbook states that we will provide up to 3 months of leave for any employee disabled by pregnancy, childbirth or related medical conditions. An extension can be requested by contacting the agency president at least two weeks before the scheduled expiration of the leave. Extensions are decided on a case-by-case basis. This leave is unpaid. Vacation benefits do not accrue during this time period. We are an agency of 9 employees in Northern California (East Bay - outside of San Francisco).

Ann Adams
Controller
J. Stokes & Associates

We are small too (we were bigger, but the dot-com demise in CA affected us greatly). We had an HR professional draft our handbook when we were larger - state and federal guidelines were followed though, so we continue to follow it at our current size. I have pasted the sections below pertaining to leave. It's long, but information is good.

LEAVES OF ABSENCE

Policy A leave of absence may be granted to maintain continuity of service in an instance where unusual or unavoidable circumstances require an associate¡s absence from work. A leave is generally granted on the assurance by the employee that he/she will be available to return to work upon expiration of the leave.

It is RBG¡s policy to grant leaves to eligible associates without regard to age, sex, race, color, religion, marital or veteran status, national origin, citizenship, ancestry, mental or physical disability, medical condition or any other classification protected by applicable law.

Types of Leaves Medical Pregnancy Disability Military Bereavement Jury Duty Personal

The following section provides a description of each type of leave:

Medical Leave Eligible associates may request an unpaid medical leave for a serious health condition that requires in-patient care in a hospital, or continuing treatment or supervision by a health care provider. An associate seeking this type of leave must provide RBG with a medical certification from his or her health care provider establishing the need for the leave, and must provide the Company with a release to return to work from the health care provider before returning to his or her job.

Pregnancy Disability Leave Up to 4 months of unpaid pregnancy leave will be made available to any female associate who is actually disabled by pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions. Associates may utilize accrued PTO benefits during pregnancy leave. Following a pregnancy leave of absence, RBG will reinstate the employee to the same or comparable position in accordance with the Company¡s obligation under California law. RBG reserves the right to require a doctor¡s verification of ability to return to work at the conclusion of leave.

Military Leave Associates serving in the Armed Forces or Reserves will be granted a temporary, unpaid military leave in accordance with applicable state and federal laws, including those relating to reinstatement following a military leave. Exempt employee will be eligible to take such a leave on a paid basis as allowed by law; however, their pay will be reduced by any military pay they receive while on military duty.

Bereavement Leave A paid leave of up to 3 days is available to benefited employees who have completed their 90-day introductory period for the purpose of handling matters related to a death in their immediate family. Immediate family is defined as: father, mother, current father-in-law, current mother-in-law, sister, brother, current spouse, domestic partner or child. Following a death among other family members not defined as "immediate family", one-day bereavement pay may be granted.

Jury Duty or Witness Appearance All associates are encouraged to participate in community affairs, including serving on jury duty. Employees may take time off to serve on a jury or to appear as a witness as required by law if, before taking time off, the employee gives reasonable notice to the Agency. If however, the length or timing of the jury duty or witness appearance will cause an undue hardship for the Company, the associate may request that the court postpone or excuse the associate¡s service.

To be paid for the time away from work, the associate must provide his/her manager with evidence of serving on jury duty. The employee should remit to the company the certificate verifying the dates and times of service and the check stub received from the county¡s accounting office. The emp

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