What is a caregiver leave?
A caregiver leave is designed to provide time off for an employee to care for a family member with a serious health condition. If you're providing care to a loved one, you may be eligible to take leave through a combination of federal law, state programs, or employer policy.
What is a caregiver?
A caregiver is someone who provides care to a loved one with long or short-term needs due to serious illness, injury, or disability.
They provide care when a family member is unable to care for their own medical, safety or other needs. This may include meal preparation, physical care, transportation to the doctor, or providing psychological comfort and reassurance to your loved one.
A primary caregiver is responsible for taking care of this person more than anyone else.
What is a serious health condition?
Under the FMLA, a serious health condition is considered to be an illness, injury, impairment, or physical or mental condition that involves
inpatient care in a hospital, hospice, or residential medical care facility; or
continuing treatment by a health care provider.
How do I know if I qualify for caregiver leave?
When designing a caregiver leave within Cocoon, we will help determine what laws, entitlements, and policies may apply to your leave.
This will take into account your length of service at your employer, state of residence, and relationship to the person needing care in order to determine what leave you may be eligible for.
What do I do once I've planned my leave?
Once your leave is planned within Cocoon, you'll want to submit your leave as soon as possible. This alerts your HR team to your intention to take leave, and kicks off the process.
Depending on what state you're in, you may have state programs eligible to you that require your coordination with your loved one's medical provider in order to file claims.
Cocoon will automatically identify any state benefits you may be eligible for. Visit the My tasks tab on your Cocoon dashboard for step-by-step instructions on required forms you need to complete and any claims you may need to file to receive full pay. See the screenshots below for an example of a caregiver leave in California.
What do I do if I don't qualify for caregiver leave?
If you do not qualify to design a leave plan within Cocoon, that means that there are no laws, entitlements, or policies that apply to your leave. If you have questions around qualifying for leave, reach out at [email protected].
If you need to take time away from work to provide care to a loved one, and are not able to create a leave plan, you may reach out to your HR team to see what options are available to you.
Have Questions? We're here to help!
Email us at [email protected]