In the Media
The Pregnant Workers Family Act Has Been Finalized — Here’s What Employers Should Know
Read Time: 1 minOf Counsel Melissa Losch was interviewed by Employee Benefit News on June 18, 2024, for an article about the impacts of the Pregnant Workers Family Leave Act (PWFA).
An employer can only deny accommodations if they can prove it causes them “undue hardship.” But companies should avoid that excuse if at all possible and instead do their best to work with their employee towards a solution, underlines Melissa Losch, a labor and employment attorney at McGlinchey Stafford.
“The [PWFA] goes a little bit beyond what people initially thought of pregnancy accommodations, so employers need to be careful with that,” says Losch. “Communication between employer and employee will be key to finding a practical solution and avoiding legal problems.”
Losch notes that landing on the right accommodations should come from what the PWFA refers to as an “interactive process” — an employer and employee discuss and identify reasonable accommodations and, hopefully in doing so, avoid refusing an employee on the basis of “undue hardship.”
Read more (subscription required).