FMLA Marks 16th Anniversary Today

The Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) marks its 16th anniversary today (Feb. 5, 2009) in a beefed-up version that now allows family of service members to take up to 26 weeks of unpaid leave to care for their relatives in the military. Of course, provisions for 12 weeks of unpaid leave to care for oneself or one's family, or for the birth or adoption of a child, are still on the books.

Some 7 million of the FMLA-eligible 77.1 million workers took leave in 2005, the latest year for which statistics have been released.

As I was reading up on FMLA today, one other statistic stuck out, courtesy of a group called AAUW, to wit:

A 2008 study by the Institute for Health and Social Policy found that only five of the 173 countries surveyed did not guarantee at least some form of paid maternity leave to its workers. These countries are Lesotho, Liberia, Swaziland, Papua New Guinea, and our very own USA. Illustrious company, to say the least.

August company to say the very least when you figure that 98 of these countries offer at least 14 weeks of paid leave.

New Regulations Flying Right and Left

Mostly right, I guess, given the composition of the current administration.

Much indeed has been made of Bush's so-called "midnight regulations," which no doubt face reversal under Obama and the Democratic Congress, but one set of regulations looks to be ensconced for a while. That would be the Final Rule issued Nov. 17, and taking effect next Jan. 16, to expand and clarify the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA).

Since 1993, FMLA has afforded workers with health care and family needs the option to take up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave, either consecutively or intermittently. The Final Rule keeps this option intact but shifts more of the notification and certification responsibility to the employees themselves. For the first time, it even gives employers the right to verify the health provider's certification of the employee's condition and treatment, but only to the extent of verifying the provider's signature and whether he or she actually issued the certification.

Too much on that already, but the main idea is that employers, after two years of input to the Department of Labor, got what they wanted in terms of ending employee (alleged or perceived) abuse of FMLA.

The other big part of the Final Rule is that it adds two categories of leave for relatives of service members. One category affords 26 weeks of unpaid leave to tend to an injured service member (certain conditions apply, of course), and the other category provides up to 12 weeks for certain "exigencies," for instance, to join a service member when he or she is home on leave or when he or she is preparing to be deployed.

Unions and employee advocates are naturally cheering the military component but deriding the new employee notification and certification policies.

At any rate, it will take a long time to go about changing or reversing these new regulations and clarifications, though President-elect Obama has already announced he wants to expand FMLA to employers with just 25 or more employees in a 75-mile radius (down from the current 50). He also wants to pass legislation mandating that all employers allow paid leave.

We'll just have to wait and see as a more employee- and union-friendly administration takes over, so we can then "fly left."

The Never-Ending Regulation Mill

Anyone out there ever try keeping up with all the workplace regulations foisted on us business owners by the federal and state (and sometimes local) governments?

Try reading through the latest iteration of the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) that came out Nov. 17, 2008.

You need a guidebook to wade your way through it, so why bother? Don't we have better things to do, like surviving in a challenging economy?

Fortunately, we don't have to spend hours and days pouring through these gov regs, as I call them.. There are a bunch of Web sites, blogs and newsletters that can help yus cope with complying with workplace regulations.

I have several such sites bookmarked on my browser, but I also rely on Personnel Concepts to keep me informed, which they do quarterly, and daily on their site. They do the research and then keep me up to date.

There are other providers out there that I've checked into, but Personnel Concepts seems to have been around longer and honed their skills better.

More on keeping up in future posts.