Maryland Paid Family and Medical Leave Insurance Program FAQs

The Maryland Department of Labor’s Division of Family and Medical Leave Insurance (FAMLI) has released a Frequently Asked Questions document for employers about the forthcoming program. Starting in January 2026, the program will provide most Maryland employees with 12 weeks of paid family and medical leave, with the possibility of an additional 12 weeks of paid parental leave, as we have previously detailed in our E-lerts from April 12 , 2023 and April 12, 2022.

As the FAMLI Division notes, however, there is pending legislation to further modify the FAMLI law, including a possible additional delay in the effective date (which has already been pushed off by a year). Moreover, the FAMLI Division is working on regulations to implement the FAMLI program, which we detailed in our January 30, 2024 E-lert. Thus, the FAMLI Division warns that there may be changes to the FAQs in the future.

We further note that most of the FAQs cover basic information, albeit in a readily accessible and understandable format. It does not address many of the more sophisticated questions that we have repeatedly raised in our writings and to the FAMLI Division – including how to report employee fraud (particularly if it is discovered after the employee already begins receiving paid leave benefits) and what the consequences are for such fraud, what to do about remote employees, and how to actually set up a private equivalent plan (which will be addressed in the regulations, although as we already pointed out, the draft regulations propose an incredibly challenging process).