Time off - Michigan

Employer coverage

Employers with 50 or more employees are covered by the Paid Medical Leave Act. The U.S. government, another state, and a political subdivision of another state are not covered by this law.

Employee eligibility

Employees are eligible if they are non-exempt, work in the state, work at least 25 hours in a calendar year, and have worked an average of at least 25 hours per week during the preceding calendar year. Employees are not eligible if they work for a private employer under a collective bargaining agreement, work for the government, variable hour employees as defined by the federal Affordable Care Act, and certain temporary help agency employees.

Leave entitlement

Employees accrue one hour of sick leave for every 35 hours worked.

Employers who provide at least 40 hours of paid leave to an eligible employee is considered to be in compliance with the state law.

Employees begin to accrue as of the effective date of the law or upon hire, whichever is later. Employees may generally use the leave as it is accrued, but employers may require employees to wait until 90 days after hire before using the leave.

Employers are not required to allow employees to accrue more than one hour of paid medical leave in a calendar week.

Employers may limit an employee’s accrual of paid medical leave to 40 hours per year. Employers are also not required to allow an employee to carry over more than 40 hours of unused accrued paid medical leave from one year to another, or to allow employees to use more than 40 hours of paid medical leave in a single year.

Instead of allowing for accrual and carry over, employers may frontload 40 hours of paid medical leave at the beginning of a year.

Leave must be taken in one-hour increments, unless the employer has a policy indicating otherwise.

Qualifying reasons

• The employee’s own mental or physical illness, injury, or health condition; medical diagnosis, care or treatment of the condition; or preventative medical care.
• A family member’s mental or physical illness, injury, or health condition; medical diagnosis, care or treatment of the condition; or preventative medical care. Family members include biological, adopted, or foster child, stepchild or legal ward, or a child to whom the employee stands in as a parent; biological parent, foster parent, stepparent, or adoptive parent, or a legal guardian of an employee, or an individual who stood in as a parent when the employee was a child; legally married spouses; grandparents; grandchildren; or a biological, foster, or adopted sibling.
• If the employee or family member is a victim of domestic violence or sexual assault, for medical care or psychological or other counseling for physical or psychological injury or disability, to obtain services, to relocate, or to participate in proceedings related to the violence or assault.
• The closure of the employee’s workplace due to a public health emergency, for an employee to care for a child whose school or place of care is closed due to a public health emergency, or when the employee or family member should be quarantined because of a communicable disease.

Notice, pay, penalties

When requesting leave, employees must comply with the employer’s usual and customary notice, procedural, and documentation requirements for requesting leave. Employees have three days to provide the employer with requested documentation.

Employers are not required to pay an employee for accrued earned sick time that was not used upon the employee’s separation from employment.

Employers must display a poster regarding this law.

Employees are to be paid at a rate equal to the greater of either the normally hourly wage, the employee’s base wage, or the minimum wage under state law.

Failure to provide leave under the law can result in penalties of up to $1,000.00. Employees may also receive payment of leave.

Related records are to be kept for at least one year.