Curious about what BOTB thinks: Maternity Benefits (poll)

easjer05 · November 2011

It's popped up elsewhere a few times, wondering what the consensus is here. If an employee receives some maternity benefits through work, and chooses to leave her job, should she wait to try and receive the maternity benefits? Let's assume this is not utilizing accrued/earned leave or a system by which the employee has otherwise already paid for the benefits.

So employee X gets three weeks of fully paid leave, and say, another 3 weeks at 50% pay, and can take an additional 8 weeks unpaid (or can use any accrued leave/PTO/etc). Additionally, the employer continues their portion of health insurance premiums and matched retirement contributions during this time.

It is unknown whether or not the employer would require the employee to return to work for a certain amount of time or have to payback some or all of the benefits accrued during leave.

[Poll]

baze2 · November 2011

Depends on the type of person she is...

I am very interested to see how this turns out. I will reveal my vote: First option. I feel like the second option is the "stick it to um" option. However, I come from a very very different background than most. I own the business. However, when I worked as an RN at a hospital, I took a leave of absence to be a camp nurse in maine. I was gone for two months. They allowed it without any questions. I knew I wanted to leave the job but worked for another year to "re-pay" them for the leave. (Part of this year was part time)

lwogsland · November 2011

GhostMonkey:

After is fraud and your employer can come back on you for the benefits you recieved. Many do have a clause that states you must return to work for X amount of time or they will come after you for repayment.

I know my work requires you to come back for a certain amount of time, or you are expected to pay them back for the cost of benefits..so by not quitting ahead, you'd be screwing yourself over

easjer05 · November 2011

Right, I agree with GM - employers can come back on you. Here, if you leave without returning to work, you are required to pay back any health insurance premiums and they can go after you for retirement benefits (but they never do - too expensive to hassle with). Of course, there is no paid mat leave, it's only whatever accrued leave you have available to you.

But I also think it's simply unethical. It hurts so many people - the employer, the coworkers who are picking up the slack, potentially the clients or work product - because the re-arranging is done with an eye towards a short view. We got really screwed by a situation in which someone left in that manner (not mat leave though), and the short-term reassignments were never intended to be long term, but dragged on for months while we looked for a replacement, and we're still digging out of that mess months later.

Not to mention, things like that are the biggest reason employers are not offering decent maternity benefits and have back-of-their-mind grudges against hiring women with children or of child-bearing age. They don't want to deal with the hassle of replacements and the uncertainty of return to work.

I don't know if my view is colored by the situation I mentioned above and by the fact I deal with HR - it's possible I'm projecting a bit.

jewerner · November 2011

Depending on your work relationship 1 might be the better choice, however my situaiton may end up with #2. Not to stick it to em, but because I INTEND on going back to work at the moment,but if we find we can make ends meet Id really prefer to stay at home, and will be playing it by ear. It sucks but I mean.. it happens. Family fist and that comes with financials.

staycee · November 2011

GhostMonkey:
Though she didn't get any benefits during that time, so the company wasn't out anything.

they were out not being able to have her train her replacement and get a new person up to speed before she left.

weelass24 · November 2011

I picked option B. My company fully expects that some people will not return and has a policy in place. the policy is that you must inform your manager if you are not returning within 2 days of your expected return date. Period.

So, its not a violation of any sort at my company.

PDXtbird · November 2011

Interesting note on this topic (kind of). Before I got pregnant we got a new manager from our Provo, Utah branch. (This branch is 100% Mormon, all male managers and sales reps and all female secretaries.) At the same time a co-worker got pregnant and also happened to be working under this new manager. The new manager cornered me (staff manager) and asked me why we were planning for her promotion if she was having a baby. I said "because she wants to move into this position when she comes back from maternity leave, like I said in the meeting earlier." He was utterly confused about the whole "coming back after maternity leave." Apparently no one in our Provo branch had ever returned to work after their leave.

AKay25 · November 2011

GhostMonkey:
After is fraud and your employer can come back on you for the benefits you recieved. Many do have a clause that states you must return to work for X amount of time or they will come after you for repayment.

This. I always planned on returning but I am 99% sure that my employer stipulates that if you don't come back you have to repay what they paid you while you were out.

[Deleted User] · November 2011

The user and all related content has been deleted.

mommy0411 · November 2011

This is an interesting question because between my husband and I we have experienced both sides of this.

When I found out I was pregnant I knew I would not be coming back. I told my principal in January that I wouldn't be taking maternity leave and would just be quitting because he was really concerned about the school's budget. I left April 1st.

One of my husbands co workers, had a son in February and kept telling them she was going to come back. She ended up extending her leave several times but she never came back. It took them 2 months to figure out that she had basically quit without telling them. She took valuable resources from the company (its a tiny company only 24 people). I though she was very dishonest about the entire situation and unfair to the company.

mylittlesunshine · November 2011

I agree and think it is totally unethical to take benefits and not return. Not to mention, if you were a good employee before and put a lot of work into what you did, you might burn a few bridges if you ever looked for work again and had/wanted to use them as a reference.

Optimus+Prime · November 2011

I think it's unethical and morally wrong to take the benefits when you have absolutely no intention on returning to work.

However, I think It's a grey line when you're not sure if you'll return. Sometimes you think you'll go back to work and after spending so much time away you decide you don't want to go back. I don't think that's wrong.

lenloe · November 2011

heh, i feel like i just walked into an SAT math problem.

MrsT2008 · November 2011

I am not sure if there are penalties at my company for taking leave and then not returning to work at all - I know they don't require you to have a definite return-to-work date when you start your leave. They just tell you to keep your manager in the loop.

That said, I personally wouldn't feel right about taking all of my leave benefits if I knew I had no intention of returning to work.

greenclown · November 2011

weelass24:
I picked option B. My company fully expects that some people will not return and has a policy in place. the policy is that you must inform your manager if you are not returning within 2 days of your expected return date. Period.

So, its not a violation of any sort at my company.

Same with my old job. In fact, that's exactly what I did. My circumstances were a little different, though. I was planning on having a living baby and going back to work. I'm excused.

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