8 Steps to Maximizing Maternity Leave in New York State
I had a baby in December of 2018 and will be having another baby in April 2020. Here are the steps I took to get maternity leave in New York State. Unfortunately, every state, company, and short term disability plan is different. But this will hopefully provide a guideline. I am not an expert. I am a normal person who took maternity leave and knows how to google. (This is mostly written from the point of view of a mother who is pregnant and giving birth to a child. Fathers and parents adopting can qualify for some of these benefits but not all.)
Step 1: Do you qualify for FMLA?
When you have a child (or adopt a child) you may be eligible for unpaid leave under the federal Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA). FMLA is a federal program, meaning anyone in the United States (male or female) can use this leave. It is 12 weeks of unpaid leave. (You can only take this leave once in a 12 month period. Typically, this is for a “rolling” 12-month period measured backward from the date of any FMLA usage.)
To qualify, you must meet all of these requirements:
- The employee must have been employed with the company for 12 months in the past 7 years.
- The employee must have worked at least 1,250 hours during the 12 months prior to the start of FMLA leave
- The employer is one who employs 50 or more employees within a 75-mile radius of the worksite
This is the backbone of your maternity/parental leave. Short term disability (which is covered in the next section) will run concurrently to FMLA time off. This means you can’t use 12 weeks of unpaid time, and then 6 weeks of short term disability for a total of 18 weeks off - you have to use them at the same time.
Another important thing to remember about FMLA is that it offers you job protection. This means you cannot get fired while you are out on FMLA. This is important because Short Term Disability does not offer job protection.
Step 2: Tell your employer
Now is typically a good time to tell your employer that you are pregnant. I have done this between 13 and 20 weeks. The legal requirement for the amount of time you need to tell your employer before you are out is 30 days:
Employees generally must request leave 30 days in advance when the need for leave is foreseeable. When the need for leave is foreseeable less than 30 days in advance or is unforeseeable, employees must provide notice as soon as possible and practicable under the circumstances.
If you are planning to adopt and you are placed with a child without 30 days notice, you would fall under the 2nd category of “possible and practicable”.
Typically, you want to tell your supervisor first, then your Human Resources (HR) representative, and then other co-workers. Usually HR will have some kind of a form to fill out that is just for the company saying that you will be requesting leave. If your employer has any kind of maternity leave program, now is good time to ask about that as well. HR will also give you information on Short Term Disability, because New York State requires employers to provide it (see next section).
Step 3: File a Short Term Disability Claim
Maternity leave typically falls partially under Short Term Disability (STD) insurance.
New York is one of the few states that has a temporary disability insurance program, which requires employers to provide short-term disability insurance for their employees…Pregnancy and childbirth are covered under the law.
While the above quote is accurate, DBL-exempt employers do not need to provide STD insurance. If you work for a DBL-exempt employer (a public school, a charity, etc.) then you may want to look into purchasing STD insurance privately. If you plan on purchasing STD insurance, be sure to do it before trying to get pregnant. If you are already pregnant and apply for STD, they will not cover your current pregnancy, but may cover future pregnancies.
The idea is that literally the physical act of giving birth disables you from working and so mothers get paid time off via STD insurance. Every STD plan is different. Contact your STD insurance company for more information. A typical amount of time off is 6 weeks for a vaginal birth and 8 weeks for a C section, paid at about 50%. For an adoption, you would not be eligible for STD.
Typically, you want to file a claim before you give birth. I worked with Liberty Mutual (or Lincoln Financial Group) because this is the plan my employer offers. You can do this by calling the company or going online. You usually answer some questions or fill out a form. You won’t hear anything more until after you would like to start your STD leave.
I did not experience this first hand, but I believe if you are put on bed rest by a doctor you can get additional short term disability leave via a 2nd claim. Also bed rest would be covered by FMLA.
An employee who becomes disabled more than four to six weeks prior to giving birth or continues to be unable to work more than four to six weeks after giving birth may have to submit additional medical documentation to support her claim.
HOWEVER, as mentioned above, STD does not offer job protection. Therefore, if you use 2 weeks of STD before your baby is born, you will only have your job protected for 10 weeks after they are born. After that, your employer may be able to fire you for excessive absence.
Step 4: Apply for New York State Paid Family Leave
In 2018 New York State (NYS) started a Paid Family Leave (PFL) program that will increase each year until 2021. Not many states have benefits like this, so it is nice that NYS offers it. This leave is available to both mothers and fathers and does not require you to physically birth the child (unlike STD).
To qualify, you must:
- Have worked for your employer the last 26 weeks, 20 hours or more per week OR
- Have worked for your employer a total of 175 days, with less than 20 hours per week
- Be employed by a non-DBL-exempt employer.
The last bullet means that typically an employer who is exempt from providing DBL (Statutory short-term Disability Insurance) will not provide PFL benefits either. These employers do have the option to voluntary opt-in if they so choose, but typically they do not. For more information check out the link above, but this means public school teachers, those who work for non-profits, etc. do not get to use NYS PFL.
In 2020, this program allows for 50 days of leave paid at 60%. (Check here for more information on the financials.) NYS PFL does not run concurrently with STD. Meaning if you qualify for STD then you can take all of that leave, and then start the 50 PFL days after that. Another great thing about the NYS PFL program is that it does offer job protection! So even if the 12 weeks of FMLA runs out, your job and health insurance are still protected.
Applying for NYS PFL happens generally through an insurance carrier that manages the PFL claims for the company you work for. So in my case, this was Libery Mutual again. Here are the generic steps from ny.gov:
1) Employee notifies employer 30 days prior to leave, when practical.
2) Employee fills out a claim form according to employer instructions. Claim forms are available from employer, insurance carrier, or ny.gov/paidfamilyleave.
3) Employee obtains supporting documentation for leave (birth certificate, military deployment certification, etc.)
4) Employee submits claim form and supporting documentation to insurance carrier or as directed by employer. Insurance carrier must pay or deny a claim within 18 days of receipt of the completed claim.
This is the claim form provided by NYS. You might use this form, or you might use a different form created by the insurance company handling your PFL claim. Typically, you will want to state your intent to use PFL days before your child is born, but it may be hard to apply because it can sometimes require knowing the date of birth and the exact days you will be taking leave.
Step 5: What does your employer offer? How does that interact with these other government policies?
Every company is different. Some may offer no parental leave, others may offer 6 months or more. Ask your HR representative what your company offers. There may be rules such as how long you have to have worked for the company, and what percentage of your pay you will receive. You will receive whatever is the highest amount of money between your company policy and the government policies, but not both. You will not make more than 100% of your paycheck while out on maternity leave.
For example, let’s say your employer offers 12 weeks of 100% paid maternity leave. STD or PFL would run concurrently with your employers program, and your employer would be allowed to accept the money that you would receive from these government programs on your behalf. So if you were to receive 60% of your paycheck on STD during the first 8 (or 6) weeks of maternity leave, then your employer will actually receive that 60%, and then give you that money plus an additional 40% in your paycheck from them. It will work the same way for NYS PFL. If your employer plans on playing you 100% of your paycheck for the 4–6 weeks after STD ends, they will be able to collect PFL checks on your behalf and use that money to pay your salary. You will still get your full paycheck from your employer, but you will also be using up PFL days at the same time. Here is a quote from ny.gov:
If the employer has an internal policy that provides the employee with full wages while the employee is on Paid Family Leave, the employer can pay the employee up front and then request reimbursement from the insurance carrier, up to the amount of the Paid Family Leave benefit.
If, such as in the timeline above, your employer does not offer as much paid time off as is offered from the NYS PFL program, then you can use the remainder of your PFL days after your employer parental leave program has ended. So in the example showed above, the employee would have 30 days of PFL left to use after the 12 weeks of paid leave has ended.
Step 6: Plan your leave
If you qualify for FMLA, STD, and PFL, you will get a total of 80–90 days (depending on C-section or vaginal birth) of partially paid maternity leave which is 16–18 weeks. You can either take this time all at once when the baby is born, or split it up. Typically leave under FMLA isn’t intermittent (but it does not have to be the full 12 week duration). Your employer can agree to allow leave to be used intermittently, but they aren’t required to allow it. STD needs to be taken all at once after your child is born. You cannot split the 6 weeks of STD by working in between. PFL can be used all at once or in 1 day increments. This is great because you can do something like work 3 days a week while you are adjusting back to full time work. You cannot take half PFL days; it only works for full day increments. Obviously, you can always use sick time or vacation time to supplement these policies. NYS does not have any laws against “use-it-or-lose-it” vacation policies (like some other states) so it may be hard to save up a lot of time this way, but it is something to consider when planning your maternity leave.
Step 7: After the baby is born
Once the baby is born, you will have to call/email all interested parties to update your leave plan. This will include your employer, the company managing your STD, and the company managing your PFL. You may also need to provide some kind of “proof” such as a birth certificate.
After you give birth you will call the STD insurance company to report which day the baby was born (not always your due date) and which day you started STD (not always the baby’s birth date). The STD insurance company will either issue checks directly to you, or to your employer if they have monetary parental leave benefits that are higher than the amount you would receive with STD. The same goes for PFL payments. See the explanation of this above in Step 5.
You probably also have to finishing filling out your PFL claim form and send that in. Be sure to do it before or within 30 days after you want to take your first PFL day. If you are taking leave continuously (meaning all at once) you will only need to provide a start and end date. If you are taking days intermittently, you will need to individually list out each of the 50 dates you plan to take PFL. The checks that you receive for PFL do not have taxes taken out of them. You can make federal and state tax payments during the year to avoid penalties at the end of the year when filing taxes.
Step 8: Take and report your leave
To return to work you may need your doctor to fill out a work release form and return it to your employer. It is a good idea to bring this to your 6 week postpartum visit. You will probably need to check in with your supervisor occasionally (maybe once a month) while on leave to confirm that your plans have stayed the same (or report a change). The STD company may call you when your leave is finishing up. If you are using PFL days on an intermittent or somewhat intermittent schedule, you may need to call more frequently or fax time cards to the insurance company managing your PFL claim for each day that you use. Don’t rely on your employer, the insurance company, or the government, to keep track of the days you take off and pay you accordingly. During my first stint of maternity leave I was both overpaid and underpaid at different times. Its important to keep a record of all the days you took off and all the checks you received during your time on leave. Occasionally, time cards and paperwork will get “lost in the mail” and you will have to file again.
In the end, I ended up splitting time off with my husband giving my children 6 months at home before daycare. While you will want to maximize the amount of time you spend at home with your child, the amount of income you can afford to lose will also be a big factor into your decision making. It’s a personal decision and you might have different feelings about it after your child is born than you did beforehand. I hope in the future that every parent has the option to take as much time as she feels she needs without pay being a concern.