Unpaid Leave of Absence Policy

Objective

In an effort to recognize the need of employees who require time off in addition to other types of leave, MCO may consider an unpaid personal leave of absence without pay for up to a maximum of 30 days.

Eligibility

All regular employees employed by MCO for a minimum of 90 days are eligible to apply for an unpaid personal leave of absence. Job performance, absenteeism, and departmental requirements all will be taken into consideration before a request is approved. Approvals of the immediate supervisor, department director and human resources are required. Requests for unpaid personal leave may be denied or granted by the company for any reason or no reason and are within the sole discretion of the company. MCO reserves the right to terminate employment for any reason or no reason during the leave of absence.

Procedures

Employee
An eligible employee should submit a request in writing to his or her immediate supervisor. The requesting employee will be asked to acknowledge in writing his or her understanding that all requests for personal leaves are not granted.

Supervisor

The immediate supervisor will:

∙Review the request taking workload scheduling and departmental requirements into consideration.

∙Make a recommendation to and obtain a decision from the department director/manager.

∙Submit the department-level decision to human resources for final approval.

∙Return a decision to the employee as soon as feasible after receipt of the written request.

If the request is approved, the supervisor will submit a Change of Status form to human resources as soon as practicable. Once the employee returns, the supervisor should complete a Change of Status form returning the employee to active status and submit to human resources.

Payroll

Payroll is responsible for ensuring that any employee on an approved personal leave of absence is not paid.

Return to work/extension of leave
An employee is required to return from the unpaid personal leave on the originally scheduled return date. If the employee is unable to return, he or she must request an extension of the leave in writing. If MCO declines to extend the leave, the employee must then return to work on the originally scheduled return date or be considered to have voluntarily resigned from his or her employment. Extensions of leave will be considered on a case-by-case basis.