USERRA & Employer paid benefits

pattyo

Even though an employee on military leave pays for health benefits through COBRA, what about the benefits such as LIFE, STD & LTD where an employer pays 100%? Is the employer obligated to maintain those coverages through the military leave?

As a company, when an employee is on short or long term disability, we continue to pay for those benefits until the employee returns.

Julie Athey

I believe you need to look at 20 C.F.R. § 1002.150, which states (in general) that employees who are on military leave must be given the same non-seniority benefits as employees on other comparable types of leave. That section states in part that if non-seniority benefits vary depending on the type of leave, employees who take military leave must be given the most favorable treatment accorded to any comparable form of leave.

In order to determine whether other leave is “comparable” to military leave, the regs state that the duration of the leave “may be” the most significant factor. For instance, a two-day funeral leave is not comparable to an extended military leave. Other factors to consider include the purpose of the leave and the ability of the employee to choose when to take the leave.

I’m afraid that any additional analysis on my part would be speculative because I don’t know enough about your other leave policies. Hope this helps!

Julie Athey

pattyo

Thanks for your information.

Since we continue these benefits when an employee is out on FML, I would assume this leave is comparable and the same benefit should be continued during the employee's military leave.

Family Medical Leave is the only comparable leave we have with regard to length of time an employee is out and continues to remain an employee. The employee I am talking about will be out from July 2010 to February 2011.

Does this make sense to you?