REQUESTING LEAVE UNDER THE FAMILY MEDICAL LEAVE ACT (FMLA)

Faculty members must contact the Insurance Section of Human Resources prior to any leave of absence, with or without pay, to ensure correct and timely employee contributions for insurance coverage.

The request from a faculty member to use FMLA, and the approval by the Dean/Department Head, should be done via the form, “Family and Medical Leave/Parental Leave Request and Notice.” This form may be found on the HR FMLA Benefits web-page. Please note that for faculty, “Final Review and Endorsement” on the FSU Employer Notice to Employee's Request for Family/Parental and Medical Leave form is given by the Dean/Department Head, and should not be sent to Human Resources for approval. Faculty members' Family Medical Leave requests, approvals, and certifications must be maintained in a separate, confidential file in the deans'/department heads' offices. A copy of the request, approval, and certification for FML should be sent to Angie Standley in the Dean of the Faculties office.

Family Medical Leave should be appropriately coded in OMNI by the time/leave entry coordinator. Any periods of leave of absence without pay should be effected by entering LWOP in the OMNI Pay and Leave System along with the descriptive code for FML in lieu of a Faculty Change Order; no change order should be done. This will allow proper employer contributions of State health and life insurance.

RETURNING TO WORK
Effective Tuesday, September 2, 2008, employees on continuous FMLA leave who have absences exceeding five (5) scheduled work days for a personal serious health condition will be required to furnish a Fitness for Duty Statement.  This statement is defined as a written statement from a health care provider stating that the employee is fit to return to work.  In an effort to reduce cost for the employee, this written statement can be presented in any format with minimal verbiage.  For Example, “Jane Doe can return to work on 9/15/08.”  Employees should only be restored to active employment when they have presented their supervisor with a proper Fitness for Duty Statement.

Upon receipt, please forward the Fitness for Duty Statement to the FMLA Coordinator in Human Resources to be placed in the employee’s medical file. 

For your convenience, an updated Request and Notice Form has been added to the Human Resources website at the following link:  http://www.hr.fsu.edu/PDF/Forms/timeandleave/FMLA-PL_Request_And_Notice.pdf. The new form omits the Fitness for Duty Statement as a departmental option, as the statement has become mandatory.