Holidays, when employees are not expected to work, are one of the most coveted employer benefits! We are moving into a time of year when several holidays are about to be upon us. For those of you who are responsible for administering FMLA, you have the added headache of figuring out when and if you have to pay and when and if you should count the time towards FMLA. Catapult has the cure!
Follow these guidelines below:
-
If a holiday falls in the middle of the week where an employee is on approved FMLA for the entire week, the regulations state that the holiday has no effect. This means that you can count the full week as FMLA time and do not need to make any allowance for the holiday time.
EXAMPLE: Employee is on FMLA from 8/15/24 through 9/12/24 and the Labor Day holiday occurs on 9/2/24. 9/2/24 is counted towards FMLA since the employee is on FMLA for the entire week.
-
If a holiday falls in the middle of the week where an employee is not on approved FMLA for the entire week (in other words, only on leave for a portion of the full week), then the holiday does not count as FMLA and essentially adds time back to the employee’s FMLA bucket.
EXAMPLE: Employee begins a 2-week leave on 11/27/24 and 11/28/24 is a holiday. 11/28/24 would not be counted as an FMLA day if the employee did not take FMLA for a full work week.
-
If your business shuts down for one or more weeks and no one works, then you should not count that week or weeks towards FMLA.
-
Holiday pay is not required under FMLA so look to your own policies on how to handle payment. In general, you should treat your employees on FMLA the same way you would others on non-FMLA leave for pay purposes.
Want to learn more?
Log onto the Member HUB and go here:
Other Resources:
Catapult offers training courses that take a deeper dive into all things FMLA, and the HR Advisors are also here to help. Reach us at 866-440-0302 or advice@letscatapult.org.
