Jay Trucks and Associates Legal Blog

The Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) allows employees to take unpaid leave from their job in order to handle family or medical emergencies.

In order to qualify for FMLA leave, you must have been a paid employee for the entire year prior to applying for leave, and you must have worked at least 1,250 hours during that time period.

Under the FMLA, you are entitled to receive up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave during a one-year period. In order to qualify for leave, one of the following circumstances must exist:

• The birth of a new child
• The placement of a child for adoption or foster care
• To care for an immediate family member (spouse, child, or parent) who has a serious medical condition or disability
• You are unable to work due to a serious medical condition

You are required to give your employer 30 days notice of your need to take FMLA leave when your leave is foreseeable. If your FMLA leave is not foreseeable, you must notify your employer as soon as you are aware of the need to take leave. You must also supply your employer with information explaining why you need to take FMLA leave in order to prove that you meet FMLA qualifications.

Under the FMLA, employers are not allowed to prevent you from exercising the rights provided to you by this law or to discriminate against you in any way for filing for FMLA leave. If your employer does not abide by the terms of the FMLA, he may be held legally accountable for his actions.

If you are having problems with exercising your FMLA rights, please contact the attorneys at Jay Trucks & Associates, P.C. today to schedule an appointment with one of our employment law specialists. We serve clients in the Flint, Saginaw, and Lansing, Michigan area.

If you have recently lost your job, you do not have to worry about losing your health insurance as well. In 1986, the U.S. government passed the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA), requiring employers to offer continued health care benefits to former employees for a fixed period of time. The purpose of COBRA is to ensure that former employees don’t have a lapse in their health care coverage while they look for a new job.

You are eligible to use COBRA if you have lost your job due to an involuntary termination, layoff, or voluntary termination. Furthermore, if your hours have been reduced to a level that would no longer qualify you for your company’s health insurance package, you may elect to continue coverage through COBRA. However, you may only continue coverage through COBRA if were covered by your employer’s health insurance plan at the time of your termination.

When opting for COBRA coverage, you must pay the entire insurance premium plus a two percent administrative fee. Therefore, your coverage will cost substantially more than it did when your employer was subsidizing your health plan. However, you will pay the group rate premium, saving you money over individual rate premiums.

Your employer must inform you of your right to apply for COBRA coverage within 30 days of your termination. You will then have another 60 days to apply for COBRA coverage.

In general, COBRA coverage lasts 18 months. However, if you become eligible for Social Security disability within the first two months of your COBRA coverage, you will be able to keep it for 29 months. If at some point you become insured under a new health insurance plan or you fail to make your COBRA payment, your coverage will be terminated.

The attorneys at Jay Trucks & Associates, P.C. are highly skilled in the area of employment law. If you are having difficulty obtaining COBRA coverage from a former employer, please contact the employment law attorneys at Jay Trucks & Associates, P.C. today to schedule a consultation. We serve clients in the Flint, Lansing, and Saginaw, Michigan area.