tracking intermittent hours

mushroomHR · October 2003

We have an employee who is on intermittent FML. This employee is scheduled to work 7:00 a.m.--3:30 p.m. When this employee leaves for doctor appointments during her shift she then comes back and stays later that day to make up her time so she gets paid for eight hours of work. She is an hourly employee. I have been charging her for the hours she misses work during her shift as intermittent FML time. Am I doing this correctly even though she makes up the time?

LindaS · October 2003

When I have employees who "flex" and make up their time I do NOT charge them FMLA.

AprilShowers · October 2003

I just had the exact situation today... and we decided to count time used (intermittent to go to Dr. appointments for her husband) as FMLA even though she is going to make up the time later on in the week. My reasoning: The reason she is excused to take 3 hours in the middle of the day is due to her FMLA approval and just because she is going to make up the time later, does not take away the fact that this was an FMLA realted absence.

I would love to hear other opinions on this case.

POPEYE · October 2003

I 100% agree with AprilShowers. If you don't count this time the EE can
continue to have her full entitlement even though they may have actually
used X hours. Remember, per the regs it is the Employer's right and
responsibility to designate entitlement time.

mushroomHR · October 2003

Another thought I had is that if you let one person flex their time and not count it as FML you would have to let others do the same thing--and we don't. This person just happens to work in a department where the supervisor will let her work to make up the time. Other employees aren't so fortunate and I couldn't very well charge someone else and not her. And you are correct that she could do this forever without ever using any FML time.

AprilShowers · October 2003

Mushroom-
Same situation here. We left it up to the "Managers Discretion" as to whether the time could be made up - as long as they kept track of their FMLA usage. Not all departments are capable of allowing employees to make up time.

HRPeg · October 2003

Definitely count towards FMLA...agree with the previous posters!

Don D · October 2003

[font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON 10-25-03 AT 10:10AM (CST)[/font][p]For an opposing opinion, I disagree with all of the posts. You have restructured (or have allowed the restructuring of) the employee's terms and conditions of employment so that she misses no pay and the employer continues to benefit equally from the employee's work efforts. I would not count the time missed as FMLA. FMLA, by design, is stuctured to 'take something away' from an employer by requiring that he suffer during someone's qualified absence. In this illustration, the employee misses no pay, the employer loses out on nothing and it doesn't fit the intent of FMLA.

mwild31 · October 2003

Intermittent time off is such a tough cookie - I see Don's point, but it's not the way we practice it at my company. Time away from work to attend doctor's appointments is counted towards FMLA time.

HGHAHR · November 2003

Just because you allow the employee to make up the time doesn't mean the employer isn't suffering a hardship. In the past I've allowed employees to do this as a benefit for them so they didn't have to go without pay or use up all their leave time. It was far from an ideal situation from a production standpoint, creating bottlenecks and inefficiencies, but we did it to be supportive of the employee.

mwild31 · November 2003

[font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON 11-06-03 AT 12:21PM (CST)[/font][p]HGHAHR - Good for you! Mushroom HR - still count the time away as FMLA leave though.

marc · November 2003

We allow the flexing and do not count it as FML. Our theory aligns with the concept that if banked time was used, we count the FML time, or if the ee was out of time off banks, and also did not work the full 40 hours week, we count the FML time.

And we do it for all the ees.

mwild31 · November 2003

Marc - I would review AprilShowers & Popeye's point. Here's where the rubber meets the road & the need for the policy - intermittent time off. This can become such a nightmare - see Don's new posting on FMLA to get a taste of some of the frustrations that comes about with intermittent leave.

I use the calculation of 12 weeks x 40 hours per week = 480 hours for intermittent leave purposes. Now add, say 3 days of sick/personal leave or 24 hours and then add vacation time (depending on employee longevity) say 3 weeks of vacation or 120 hours. Combine all these hours & you have 624 hours available. That equals 12 hours per week in time off. I give this math demonstration only to point out:

By not attaching the time to a doctor's appointment you are effectively loosing 12 hours of production time each year (if the employee utilized their full benefit). However, if you use vacation/sick/personal time/doctor's appointments in conjunction with FMLA time, you shouldn't go beyond the federal limit of 480 hours. 9 hours or 12? I like 9. The same thing holds true for large blocks of time off & how it's used with vacaton/sick, etc.

marc · November 2003

I think I get your point Mwild, except we don't add all of those times together, we force the concurrent use of all time banks as FML is used - trying to avoid the double dipping you describe. I can see the logic, however, in counting the FML time without regard to ees whether or not the ees paycheck is whole. I am going to re-examine our policy in light of this concept and ocnsider these changes.

This is one of the great values of this forum, one can benefit from those who have had the pain of learning the hard way.

mwild31 · November 2003

Ah - not to put too fine a point on it - I would go further to state that if you let the employee "make up the time" later in the week, etc., in an intermittent situation, you are in effect still going down the line of the 624 hours instead of the 480. As the time away from work is not counted as FMLA time & therefore leave banks are not being utilized. I hope this makes sense. x:-)

tracking intermittent hours

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