Fmla - Fair for Employees, Unfair for Companies

FMLA, fair for employees, unfair for companies

Family Medical Leave Act has become a very important issue due to employees and Companies during the last decades. Is it fair or unfair for employees to have a job back after a serious medical situation? Or is it fair or unfair for Companies to grant this benefit to employees? It seems that the majority of people consider that is totally fair for employees to have their jobs back after this circumstance. On the other hand, companies or any job place consider that this affirmation can be denied because it affects them from a financial point of view. As a result, both cases will be properly explained and a conclusion will be made.

To begin, we can define FMLA as a benefit for covered employees in a job place. What is a covered employee? These are workers that have been performing their job during a period of not less than 12 months in a work place that employs 50 or more people. According to U.S Department of Labor, FMLA involves giving a concession of up to 12 workweeks of unpaid leave during any 12 month period to these employees if one of these circumstances appears performing a job: i) for the birth or care and care of a newborn child. ii) for placement with the employee of a son or daughter for adoption. iii) to take care of a direct family member (spouse, parent or child). iv) not able to perform the job because of a serious health condition.

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These workers must have their same position back or an equivalent having: the same benefits, salary, status and all the conditions previous to the leave. Also during the time the person is not working he/she is allowed to use their health coverage. Also I want to state that one of the requirements for the employees to have this benefit is to inform their superiors about FMLA not less than 30 days before it will happen. Is this fair? I believe is totally fair because the majority of people will have a situation like this in their job lives. A good example to ask for this benefit is the care of a newborn child. Almost every woman performing their job will need an average of a year to take care of her (pregnancy) and the child (after pregnancy).

I consider this benefit as a great opportunity to engage an excellent relationship between the job and the employees. Trust and relationships are totally related, and if a person is conceded with this benefit, you can assure not to lose him/her. This can be seen as a great management principle; because you offer the best you have to your workers in order to have a better performance on a job.

In other words, good managing involves a good manager, good staff and good environment. All these three components are entirely related and that makes the manager dependent on their employees, consequently, a good treat for them is a confident action to execute in order to have the best results for the company. From the employee view, it is imperative to sense certain grade of reliance from which you work, therefore employees will perform their job much better knowing that the place where they work is consistent in every managing aspect.

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In addition it is essential to mention that Companies giving this benefit avoid certain problems that can be originated from FMLA like legal actions against your company, reliability and presence within the competition. An excellent manager has to

give their employees good reasons to stay at the job, perform their work as best as they and avoid difficulties with them.

On the other hand, companies and therefore managers tend to save money by reducing their expenses in the company. This means that cases like employees having an FMLA could be considered as an opportunity to reduce expenses by letting go them because they do not qualify to be eligible for an FMLA benefit.

How Companies would be able to get rid of employees, without facing a legal action from them? In most cases, they based their decision in a study they perform to investigate how this employee obtained the job, how much time the person has been working there and many other requirements that make them not eligible to acquire an FMLA. If they are able to prove that, they will let the person go therefore they will be saving a lot of money from that.

Even though they can let some people go because of the eligibility, they must obey law towards employees and as usual give employees the proper benefit. This is where the other side of the discussion begins, because some Companies consider this as an unfair action. As a result if there is an eligible employee with FMLA ahead of him/she, they must give the necessary time needed to this employee.

This unfair action involves