Detroit FMLA Claims Attorneys

For millions of Michigan workers, the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) protects their jobs when they need to take time off to deal with significant life events like illness, childbirth, or a loved one’s needs. 

Companies whose workers qualify for FMLA leave may not deny it to their workers. If you’ve been denied FMLA leave, contact the Detroit FMLA attorneys at Sommers Schwartz. We can help you enforce your rights under the law and protect your livelihood. 

What Is FMLA?

The Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) allows covered workers to take unpaid leave for specified family or medical needs. It protects millions of employees, including many in Detroit and surrounding communities. 

Although FMLA doesn’t require employers to pay workers during their approved leave, employers must meet other requirements. These include: 

• Continuing to provide the same health insurance as if the employee hadn’t taken leave.
• Allowing the employee to return to their regular job at the end of the leave. 

If you have paid leave available, your employer may require or allow you to take paid leave at the same time as your FMLA leave. For example, if you have accrued one week of paid leave and need eight weeks of total leave for the birth of a child, your employer may pay you for the one week of paid leave as part of your eight weeks of overall leave. 

FMLA permits employers to find ways to complete tasks that a worker on FMLA leave would have done. For instance, if you take FMLA leave, your employer may hire a temporary or contract worker to do the essential parts of your work. Your employer may also transfer your work to your co-workers. However, when you return to work, your employer must either return you to your previous job or place you in a “virtually identical” role.

Who Is Protected by FMLA?

Unfortunately, the Family and Medical Leave Act doesn’t cover every worker. Only certain employers must provide FMLA leave to their employees. These employers include:

• Public employers, including local, state, and federal governments and public schools.
• Private employers who meet minimum size requirements. Any private sector employer who employs at least 50 employees for at least 20 work weeks per calendar year must provide FMLA leave. Joint employers and successors of covered employers (such as companies that acquire a covered company) must also provide FMLA leave. 

To be eligible for FMLA leave, an employee must work for a covered employer. The employee must also:

• Work at a covered workplace. A “covered workplace” is one where the employer has 50 or more employees within 75 miles. 
• Work enough hours. An employee must have worked at least 1,250 hours in the 12 months before the start of their FMLA leave. Hours of paid and unpaid leave don’t count toward this total.   
• Have worked consistently. The employee must have worked for the employer for 12 months within the past seven years. (Special rules apply to military servicemembers and those under contracts.) 

In addition, FMLA rules only apply to employers and employees. FMLA does not cover independent contractors and gig workers unless they are employed by a third-party company that must comply with FMLA, such as a staffing agency. 

What Conditions Qualify for FMLA in Michigan? 

FMLA leave is reserved for particular reasons, even when a Michigan employee is eligible. Qualifying circumstances include:

• The birth of a child.
• Receiving placement of a child through adoption or foster care.
• Taking time off to care for a child who arrived via birth, adoption, or foster care within one year of the child’s arrival in the household.
• Addressing a serious health condition that prevents you from doing the essential functions of your job.
• Caring for a spouse, child, or parent with a serious health condition.
• Handling any “qualifying exigency” connected to a spouse, child, or parent on active duty as a military servicemember. 

Eligible employees may take up to 12 weeks of leave in any 12-month period. Leave doesn’t have to be taken all at once and need not be taken for the same reason. For example, you may take one week of FMLA leave to rest after surgery and two more weeks a few months later to ensure your new foster child settles in comfortably. 

An eligible employee may take up to 26 weeks of leave in a 12-month period to care for a military servicemember spouse, child, parent, or next of kin suffering from a serious injury or illness,

FMLA leave for the birth or placement of a child is not restricted to one parent. Either (or both) qualified parents may take leave for a child’s birth, for newborn care, or to help the adoption or foster placement process go smoothly.

FMLA and Other Leave Laws in Michigan

In addition to FMLA, many Michigan employers must comply with the Michigan Paid Medical Leave Act. Leave under the Michigan Paid Medical Leave Act may be used:

• To care for an employee’s mental or physical health condition.
• To help a family member care for a mental or physical health condition. 
• To handle medical care (including mental health care), disabilities, or legal proceedings related to domestic assault.
• To address family and childcare needs if an employee’s primary workplace or their child’s school or daycare is closed due to a public health emergency or if the employee or a family member must quarantine. 

When both FMLA and the Michigan Paid Medical Leave Act apply, an employee’s leave can simultaneously count toward federal and state law requirements. Leave that only qualifies under one law or the other only counts toward the total leave required by that law. 

For example, suppose an employee needs to take leave for a hospital stay to treat serious injuries suffered in a domestic assault. The injuries are likely covered by both FMLA and Michigan’s paid leave law, so the leave counts against the totals allowed by both statutes. However, when the employee takes additional leave a few months later to testify against their assailant, that leave is likely covered by the Michigan Paid Medical Leave Act but not by FMLA. That leave counts against the employee’s total leave allowance under state law but not their FMLA total. 

What To Do if You’ve Been Denied FMLA Leave

Even eligible employees can face challenges when they request leave they are entitled to under FMLA. Common reasons given for denying FMLA leave include:

• Miscalculation of hours or length of time the employee has worked.
• Refusing to acknowledge the need for birth and bonding leave for a non-birthing parent or when a child is adopted or placed through foster care.
• Dismissing a health condition as not “serious” when it is covered by FMLA’s terms (such as donating an organ).
• Failing to provide employees with information about their right to FMLA leave. (Michigan employers must also provide information about the state’s Paid Medical Leave Act.) 

Sometimes, employers try to make the FMLA leave process more difficult. Examples of improper behavior from employers include:

• Demanding excessive and improper evidence of a serious health condition, such as access to an employee’s medical records. 
• Retaliating when an employee uses their FMLA leave for any qualifying reason, such as by reprimanding or demoting the employee.
• Threatening that the employee will lose their job or will be moved to a less desirable role, team, schedule, or worksite. 
• Miscalculating the employer’s eligibility requirements, such as the number of employees at a particular worksite. 

The Family and Medical Leave Act and the Michigan Paid Medical Leave Act provide essential employee protections. They recognize that employees aren’t mere cogs in a machine – they are human beings with families and health needs. Both laws penalize employers who improperly restrict or impair their employees from taking protected leave.

Contact Sommers Schwartz, P.C. Today To Discuss Your Michigan FMLA Claim

Both federal and state laws try to balance Michigan employees’ needs to maintain healthy lives and their employers’ needs to meet business goals. When an employer improperly denies or challenges leave, the employer seeks to tip that balance unfairly in their favor. 

If an employer tries to deny you FMLA or state leave, an experienced Detroit FMLA attorney will help fight for your rights. The team at Sommers Schwartz is dedicated to helping you get the leave you deserve so you can focus on your health and your family. Contact us today to learn more.