Hello..I was put on disability on Oct 16 2008 because of Pre term Labor..(High Risk Pregnancy) my due date was first Jan 19 and change to Jan 15..I Had started a new job on May 2008...they Obviously knew about all my medical Problems,me going in and out of the hospital etc,etc..I provide them with all the medical information and also gave them a day that i was planning to go back..wich was on March 2nd 2009..Now I had to be induced on Dicember 31st 2008,and after waiting almost 12 hrs they did a C-section baby was born on that night. On January 9th(yesterday) i recieved a letter from my employer telling me that they were expecting me back at work on January 8th because it was until then (12 weeks) Family leave was coverd and if i wasn`t able to go back to work on that day my position was no longer available.No this letter is post mark on jan 8th,i recieved the letter on the 9th i call my employer after reading the letter and spoke to the GM there and he told me HR send him the letter to sign and he had no idea why,so he couldnt give me any answer,he transfer me to HR and i spoke to the lady in HR in charge of the Company. She told me that because i didn`t return to work on the 8th i was terminated but elegible to re-hired if they had anything open when i was ready to work(but not guarantee) and i explained to her that i had the baby 8 days ago and had a c-section and i was still under Doctors care ,and not able to drive at least for 3 weeks...she said she understood but that was the law...now my question is...can they do this??? do i have any options?? what can i do? please anyone with answers can or replay here.Thank You

Amorales

I deleted your e-mail address for your protection; trust me, you do not want some of the spammers we've recently had here to know how to contact you.

Unless NJ has a law specifically granting you additional time over and above FMLA (TS Compliance? Betty?) then when your FMLA is up you can legally be terminated.

First off, you might want to remove your e-mail address due to spammers that come on the forum - it would be for your protection.

It seems you did not qualify for job protected FMLA or the NJ equivalent if you only started work there 5-08. You have had to be employed a year. Apparently your employer offered you time off but it was not required by law & not job protected by law. They do not have to give you any add'l. time. Even under FMLA or the NJ "FMLA" if either had applied, you would have only gotten 12 weeks of job protected leave.

Here is some info on the NJ state disability & includes info re pregnancy. However, it does not provide job protection - only income while you are disabled.

Your employer did nothing wrong re your termination. Sorry.

http://lwd.dol.state.nj.us/labor/tdi/content/faq.html

Sorry, cbg, your post wasn't there yet when I told poster to remove her e-mail address -- I started my post first but you got yours submitted off first.

Not a problem, Betty, at least we both gave her the same answer! :)

That's the most important thing.

amorales - I might just ask: If another employee takes disability leave for other than pregnancy (broken leg for example) & they had also worked there less than a year, do they get the same amount of leave as you were given? Would you get the same amount of time off (leave) as an "equivalent" employee? You do have to be treated the same as them - you can't be discriminated against due to your pregnancy.