intermittent leave, transfer to different job

bbhlaxmom

WE have a supervisor that will need intermittent leave to care for a sick child possibly for the entire year according to her Doctor's cert. WE have decided to transfer her to another position where her absences won't be such a hardship for the company and to those she supervises that need someone at the job consistently. I know we are permitted to do this as long as we don't decrease her pay, benefits or require her to work a different schedule. THis employee is threatening to sue us as she feels she's being demoted. According to all my information she can be changed to a lower level job; again as long as we don't change her pay, benefits, schedule and or from a white collar to blue collar job. Please confirm this for me. If she refuses to do the new job may we terminate her? HELP!!

Don D

You are right that the Act does allow you to do what you propose. You would be right to counsel with her about the law and your intentions and her obligations and terminate her if she was not willing to do what you asked of her. But, I would not even approve the request for intermittent leave if she would not go along with the terms you suggested. Then she would self terminate. But, be absolutely to document this all with a fine, sharp pen. And insofar as possible have another HR person as a witness to the discussions or another manager. Now that she's threatened to sue you, that becomes more important than ever.

marc

[url]http://www.dol.gov/dol/allcfr/ESA/Title_29/Part_825/29CFR825.204.htm[/url]

Check out the address above for specific information regarding your issue. I think your actions are OK, during the leave. After the leave is over, you may need to reinstate her to the old position.