News

Two new opinion letters address FMLA leave during company closure and travel to and from medical appointments.

Recently, EEOC Chair Andrea Lucas announced that one of the agency’s priorities for 2026 is supporting pregnant employees in their efforts to remain on the job during and after pregnancy. Although she expects the agency to narrow the scope of regulations under the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act, that does not mean the EEOC isn’t aggressively going after employers that aren’t in full compliance with that law.

Employers can’t interfere with the right of an employee to take FMLA leave if that employee qualifies. But what if the employee has documented performance problems prior to leave? Can the employer still discipline the employee if that discipline would have been appropriate had the employee not requested leave?

I have an exempt team member who is on approved FMLA. The employee reported to work during the approved time out of the office and worked for an hour and a half. Are we required to pay this individual for a full eight hours?

Can you please go over the fitness-for-duty process for employees returning from FMLA leave? We want to make sure our employees are ready and able to perform all their essential functions again after their FMLA time off.

Nothing says Happy New Year better than a raft of opinion letters from the Department of Labor. The letters cover the Fair Labor Standards Act and the Family and Medical Leave Act.

I have an employee out on workers’ compensation who did not apply for FMLA leave, though we think he’s eligible. Can I tell him he has to use FMLA concurrent with his workers’ comp leave?

When calculating the average number of hours worked in the past 12 months to determine FMLA hours for the current 12 months, I know I only include worked hours, not PTO, holiday or FMLA hours. I gather I don’t include PWFA missed hours as well? But what if those PWFA hours end up causing the employee to be short their 1,250 hours, and now they won’t qualify for FMLA for the next 12 months?

If an employee is injured on the job and on workers’ comp, may we issue an FMLA eligibility notice besides workers’ comp? What is the best practice to handle such situations?

We have an employee on intermittent FMLA for a chronic health condition. They work a second (part-time job) and often call in because that job causes flare-ups in their condition. They discuss this with co-workers, causing resentment. Any suggestions you have as to how this should be handled would be greatly appreciated.