Are you properly managing FMLA?

The Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) turns 15 this year and yet, there remain a number of organizations that are not prepared or properly set up to manage FMLA leave requests, or worse any potential audits. It is important to note that the burden of proof (i.e. appropriate documentation) lays in the hands of the employer, not the employee.

The FMLA provides for up to 12 weeks of job-protected unpaid leave each year for an eligible employee for any of the following reasons:

• The birth and care of a newborn or adopted child;
• To care for an immediate family member (spouse, child, or parent) with a serious health condition; or
• To take medical leave when the employee is unable to work because of a serious health condition.

Employers should be evaluating how they manage FMLA requests and whether that process would stand up to any state or federal scrutiny.  Also, they should consider areas where the process could be automated or streamlined and where technology could help.

For example, many people don’t fully understand FMLA eligibility, or don’t have the necessary information to determine an employee’s eligibility.  To be eligible, an employee must:

• Have been employed with the company for at least 12 months;
• Have worked a minimum of 1,250 hours in the previous consecutive 12 months; and
• Have not already used the 12 available weeks of leave.

Often, to make this determination, a manual and cumbersome process is involved, which takes time, and is error prone, thus increasing risk and costs.  Obviously, an automated system of tracking and recording an employee’s actual work hours and time off helps with the data collection and validation, but unfortunately, not a lot of organizations have such a system.  Those that do, continue to have issues getting to the data in a timely manner.

The risk of not doing this right grows exponentially the bigger your organization is.

Can you say that your organization has this risk mitigated?