Maternity Leave for Small Businesses

[sbvermont]

I own a small business in Vermont with my fiance. Other than the two of us we have only one full time employee. Does anyone know if there are any laws for maternity leave for such a small business. From what I've seen so far it looks like we're only obligated to give her non-paid time off. The thing is, she lives in NY and works in NY right now, but may also work some days in VT in the future.

[Corey Bryant]

business law (http://forums.smallbusinesscomputing.com/showthread.php?t=3563) might help some. I would think it matters where your company is based but if the state the employee is in "has better laws", you might be need to abide by them. Compliance Assistance —Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) (http://www.dol.gov/esa/whd/fmla/index.htm) is another URL that might help some.

Do you still have your attorney that helped complete the Employee Handbook available that might be able to help some as well?

[sbvermont]

Hi Corey, Thanks for the links. I'll check them out. You seem to be the helpful one around here aren't you?!! Funny you mentioned the Employee Handbook. I was also going to ask about that as well. We have an attorney, but since this has been our first year with an employee we haven't put it all together. that's what I'm working on now. Do you know of any sites that have helpful samples?

[Corey Bryant]

There are some general websites like Total Business (http://www.totalbusiness.com/) and All Business (http://www.allbusiness.com/). There are a few general handbook websites like Employee Handbook Template For Small Business (http://www.employeehandbookstore.com/) and Employee manual for Microsoft Word (http://www.writeexpress.com/or/employee-manual/employee-manual.html). Chances are though the attorney will have a boiler plate one as well for you. Sometimes getting a boiler plate one is good but the attorney might charge (extra) for verifying that it complies with all State and Federal regulations. This extra might be cheaper though than what is normally charged.

[JulietteKlonk]

thanks. very helpful information.

[libsonluv]

Apart from any business law one can determine the fact on his own dependinf on the mutual responsibilities in the business as well as predicaments faced by females.