Employer-Provided Leave and the Americans with Disabilities Act

Types of Maximum Leave Policies

Maximum leave policies (sometimes referred to as "no fault" leave policies) take many different forms. A common policy, especially for entities covered by the FMLA, is a flat limit of 12 weeks for both extended and intermittent leave. Other varieties exist though. Some maximum leave policies have caps much higher than 12 weeks. Others, particularly those not covered by the FMLA, set lower overall caps. Employers also frequently implement policies that limit unplanned absences. For example, a policy might permit employees to have no more than five unplanned absences during a 12-month period, after which they will be subject to progressive discipline or termination.

Employees with disabilities are not exempt from these policies as a general rule. However, such policies may have to be modified as a reasonable accommodation for absences related to a disability, unless the employer can show that doing so would cause undue hardship.

Example 12: An employer is not covered by the FMLA, and its leave policy specifies that an employee is entitled to only four days of unscheduled leave per year. An employee with a disability informs her employer that her disability may cause periodic unplanned absences and that those absences might exceed four days a year. The employee has requested a reasonable accommodation, and the employer should engage with the employee in an interactive process to determine if her disability requires intermittent absences, the likely frequency of the unplanned absences, and if granting an exception to the unplanned absence policy would cause undue hardship.