Eliminating a position while the worker is on maternity leave

[chazp]

Is this a lawsuit waiting to happen? A paper in my area is eliminating the position of a pre-press worker who went on maternity leave three weeks ago. I talked with this worker the day she left and she told me how long the leave would be. I have since been told that her position has been eliminated (the pre-press job she was doing is being done by each editor for each section of the paper (Distilling pages and sending them to the pre-press printer)) and they will send her a letter a few weeks before her leave expires. I was told they'll pay her until the leave is up and then stop.
Two questions—Does she have a legal case here? Also, should I call her and let her know now what they intend to do? The day she left, she had no clue this was going to happen.

 

[Bob Slydell]

I think the company has to find a position for her somewhere, as part of the Family Medical Leave Act. They can eliminate the position, just not the employee. At least that's my understanding.

 

[MU_was_not_so_hard]

I think the company has to find a position for her somewhere, as part of the Family Medical Leave Act. They can eliminate the position, just not the employee. At least that's my understanding.

That's my understanding, too. The job has to be with a reasonable percentage of the employee's former salary, too. So if the women's making 40k a year before maternity leave, they can't offer her a job paying 20k when she comes back.

 

[Joe Williams]

At the very least, tell her, on the sly or on the record.
How would you like it, to return to a job that you thought was still yours and find out that you don't even work there anymore? At least this would be like a bush-league form of severance, allowing her to make calls and search help-wanted ads while caring for her newborn and having some income. Maybe she's have a job, with a better boss and employer, by the time her leave ends.

 

[wickedwritah]

CNHI at its best.

 

[JR]

Flat out illegal up here.

 

[chazp]

CNHI at its best.

You guessed the company correctly.

 

[Ace]

You stay classy, CNHI!

 

[Hank_Scorpio]

Here's the Family Medical Leave Act website.

As long as she's been an employee for 12 months (doesn't have to be consecutive either) and the company has 50 employees at that site, it's illegal.

 

[Joe Williams]

Here's the Family Medical Leave Act website.

As long as she's been an employee for 12 months (doesn't have to be consecutive either) and the company has 50 employees at that site, it's illegal.

I'm rooting for the employee here, but I do have a question: What if the employer just waits until she returns, gives her a week or two, and then "downsizes" her onto the street anyway? Not to give the pricks any ideas they haven't already had, but surely she doesn't have guaranteed lifetime employment due to taking maternity leave.

 

[Sam Mills 51]

Family-owned paper and a former shop of mine did that at least twice - scumbag publisher. Shocking, I'm sure.

 

[bevo]

My understanding is if the position was going to be eliminated even if she was still working there...it's legal.

But still a terrible, terrible thing to do.

 

[Dyno]

A friend of mine was laid off the last business day before her maternity leave was to end. She went in on the Friday before she was supposed to go back to work to make the first day back a little bit less painful. Ha! Her boss asked to see her and she was terminated. She sued and while it took a lot of time, she won.

If the idiots had waited until Monday, she would have had no recourse, but because she was still technically on leave, what they did was illegal.

 

[Starman]

The Department of Labor, under the current administration (which considers the FMLA an abomination), has a thunderous lack of interest in enforcing cases of this type. The good hardworking bidness owner gets the benefit of the doubt at every turn. If these dumb broads had any brains, they'd stay home and let their rich husbands (or rich daddies) support them, instead of this disgraceful interference with the miracle of the free market.

 

[lapdog]

CNHI at its best.

You guessed the company correctly.

My money was on JRC, which pulls this **** as a matter of routine policy.

One woman at our joint wanted to take a couple months off to care for her mother. (Who, as it later turned out, was terminally ill with cancer). The publisher told the employee "you're going to have to fight for it" to get the time off, or to have a job at all when she came back.

The employee, shockingly enough, said "**** this, **** you and **** off" and quit.

The publisher immediately slithered back into his office, picked up the BobPhone to Jelenic, and reported he had just saved the company $50,000. Yippee-ki-yay, mother****ers.

 

[Precious Roy]

Here's the Family Medical Leave Act website.

As long as she's been an employee for 12 months (doesn't have to be consecutive either) and the company has 50 employees at that site, it's illegal.

Sadly, if it's a CNHI rag, 50 employees is a close call.

 

[slappy4428]

Here's the Family Medical Leave Act website.

As long as she's been an employee for 12 months (doesn't have to be consecutive either) and the company has 50 employees at that site, it's illegal.

I'm rooting for the employee here, but I do have a question: What if the employer just waits until she returns, gives her a week or two, and then "downsizes" her onto the street anyway? Not to give the pricks any ideas they haven't already had, but surely she doesn't have guaranteed lifetime employment due to taking maternity leave.

I would love to be her attorney...

 

[The Last Boy Scout]

Proof positive: No one gives a **** about you but you.

 

[Cansportschick]

Big human rights case took place in Nova Scotia, not to a journalist, but a grocery store clerk. She was terminated because she went on maternity leave. She took the fight to Human Rights Commission, and if I am not mistaken, she won the case and money too.

 

[BTExpress]

I'm rooting for the employee here, but I do have a question: What if the employer just waits until she returns, gives her a week or two, and then "downsizes" her onto the street anyway? Not to give the pricks any ideas they haven't already had, but surely she doesn't have guaranteed lifetime employment due to taking maternity leave.

I was wondering the same thing.

What makes someone on maternity leave more "untouchable" than someone not on maternity leave who is told, "We're eliminating your position. Get out." ??

Now . . . if they fired her because of her leave and hired someone else because they wanted someone there to do work . . . ILLEGAL.

But I don't see anything illegal in eliminating a position. Evil, perhaps. But not illegal.