Pregnant women in the workplace have several protections delineated in The Pregnancy Disability Leave Law (PDLL) which is part of the FEHA.
What are Employers Required to do for Pregnant Employees?
Employers must provide up to four months of leave for disability to an employees, pregnancy, childbirth or related medical conditions
Employers may be required, under certain circumstances, to transfer to an employee affected by pregnancy, childbirth or related medical conditions to a different job
Employer Must Provide Reasonable Accommodations to Pregnant Employees. Types of Reasonable Accommodations Include:
Modifying work practices, policies for duties (e.g. implementing weight lifting restrictions);
Modifying work schedules to permit early or later hours or more frequent breaks;
Providing or modifying furniture (e.g. stools or chairs);
Breastfeeding mothers also have rights. Employers must take reasonable efforts to provide a private location, other than a bathroom for an employee to express milk and must provide a reasonable amount of break time to do so
Pregnancy disability leaves under the PDLL run concurrently with leave taken under the FMLA. Thus, if an employee takes 12 weeks of leave due to a pregnancy related issue pursuant to FMLA, the employee will have exhausted her annual entitlement to FMLA leave and will have exhausted 12 weeks of the four month PDLL leave entitlement (assuming FMLA was proper).
California Law
Unlike FMLA, PDLL leave and CRFA leave do not run concurrently as they are separate and distinct rights that employees have under California law. After a lawful four month pregnancy disability leave , an employee will still have the right to take a CFRA leave of up to 12 weeks “for reason of the birth of her child, if the child has been born by this date” (provided that the entire CFRA leave was not taken prior to the pregnancy disability leave). Thus, the maximum leave an employee can take is four months per PDLL plus 12 workweeks per CFRA. An employee is only entitled to use the maximum four month if she was actually disabled by pregnancy for 4 months, and is entitled to the CFRA leave only if she meets CFRA eligibility rules and has not previously used the CFRA leave for another purpose.
If an employer allows more than four months of leave for similarly situated employees with other temporary disabilities (other than occupational disabilities) it must also extend the amount of leaves to employees that are temporarily disabled by pregnancy, childbirth or related medical conditions.
Pregnancy disability leaves are unpaid except in the following situations:
If an employer has a policy of allowing employees affected by other temporary disabilities to take paid disability leaves, it must pay the same for pregnancy disability leave.
Employers may require employees taking pregnancy disability leave to use any accrued, paid sick leave during the otherwise unpaid portion of the leave. If an employer does not require this, than an employee has the option of using the accrued paid sick leave during the otherwise unpaid pregnancy leave. An employer cannot require an employee taking leave for a pregnancy disability to use its paid vacation and/or other accrued personal time off, however, the employee may choose to do so voluntarily.
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You do not have to tolerate this abusive and humiliating behavior. For questions about pregnancy discrimination and to speak to our skilled staff, do not hesitate to contact us at Duel Law. You are not alone.
Duel Law has been successful at collecting millions of dollars on behalf of employees that have been discriminated while pregnant.
