Summary
Bereavement leave is paid or unpaid time off granted to an employee after the death of a family member or someone close to them, to grieve, make arrangements and attend a funeral or memorial. No federal law requires private employers to provide it, and FMLA does not cover bereavement as such. A handful of states do: California requires up to five days of job-protected leave at employers with five or more staff, Illinois up to two weeks at FMLA-covered employers, Oregon up to two weeks per death under its family leave act, Washington provides paid days through its family-leave programme after the death of a child, and Maryland lets employees use earned sick leave for bereavement. Most employers offer three to five paid days for immediate family and one day for extended family, and roughly six in ten private-sector workers have access to paid funeral leave. Good policy is defined broadly, applied with discretion, and tracked separately from vacation.
A bereavement policy only works if the days off are recorded as leave rather than absence. E-Monitor's attendance tracking shows planned leave distinct from unplanned absence, so nobody's grief shows up as a point on an attendance record. Start free →
What Bereavement Leave Is
Bereavement leave, sometimes called compassionate leave or funeral leave, is time away from work following a death. Its purpose is practical as well as humane: the days after a death are filled with travel, arrangements, paperwork and family obligations that cannot be scheduled around a job, and an employee who is forced to choose between them and their attendance record will usually do neither well. Most policies grant a set number of days per death, scaled to the closeness of the relationship, and let employees extend with vacation or unpaid leave where more time is needed.
Bereavement leave is distinct from sick leave (though several states let sick leave be used for it), from PTO (though many combined-bank policies draw bereavement days from it), and from FMLA leave, which covers an employee's own serious health condition and care for a family member but not the family member's death. It is one of the few leave types where the employer's discretion matters more than the rule, and the policies that work are written to give managers room to be generous.
Is Bereavement Leave Required by Law?
Federal law: no. The Fair Labor Standards Act does not require any leave, and the Family and Medical Leave Act does not list bereavement among its qualifying reasons. Federal employees may use sick leave for bereavement under OPM rules, but private employers are free to offer nothing. Where an employer does offer it, the policy becomes a term of employment and must be applied consistently.
State law: a small and growing group of states require it or allow other leave to be used for it. The table below reflects the position in 2026; confirm details with the state agency before relying on them.
| State | Law | Entitlement | Covered employers | Paid? |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| California | AB 1949 (Government Code 12945.7), since January 2023 | Up to 5 days per death of a spouse, child, parent, sibling, grandparent, grandchild, domestic partner or parent-in-law; need not be consecutive; within 3 months of the death. Separate 5-day reproductive-loss leave since 2024 | 5 or more employees | Unpaid unless the employer's policy pays; employee may use accrued paid leave |
| Illinois | Family Bereavement Leave Act, since 2023 | Up to 2 weeks (10 workdays) per death of a covered family member, including miscarriage, failed adoption or surrogacy and similar losses; up to 6 weeks for multiple deaths in 12 months; within 60 days | FMLA-covered employers (generally 50 or more employees); employee must be FMLA-eligible | Unpaid; employee may use accrued paid leave |
| Oregon | Oregon Family Leave Act | Up to 2 weeks per death of a family member, capped at 4 weeks per leave year; within 60 days | 25 or more employees | Unpaid; employee may use accrued paid leave. Paid Leave Oregon does not cover bereavement |
| Washington | Paid Family and Medical Leave | Up to 7 days of paid leave following the death of a child for whom the employee would have taken bonding leave; a 2026 amendment expanded this benefit, with effect from July 1, 2026 | Employers covered by the state programme | Paid through the state programme |
| Maryland | Healthy Working Families Act | Earned sick and safe leave may be used for bereavement of a family member | Employers covered by the sick-leave law | Paid where sick leave is paid (15 or more employees) |
| All other states | No statute | Employer policy governs; several states' sick-leave laws permit use for a family member's death | Per policy |
Multi-state employers usually write one policy that meets the most generous state they operate in and apply it everywhere, because a bereavement policy that varies by zip code is hard to explain to a grieving employee. Our state-by-state guide lists the related recordkeeping rules.
How Long Is Bereavement Leave?
Where the employer decides, the common pattern is tiered by relationship.
| Relationship | Typical paid days | Range seen in policies |
|---|---|---|
| Spouse or domestic partner, child, parent | 5 | 3 to 10, with some employers at 15 or 20 for a spouse or child |
| Sibling, grandparent, grandchild, parent-in-law | 3 | 1 to 5 |
| Aunt, uncle, niece, nephew, cousin, close friend | 1 | 0 to 3, often at manager discretion |
| Miscarriage, stillbirth, failed adoption or fertility treatment | 3 to 5 | Increasingly included after Illinois and California legislated it |
| Additional days for travel (out of state or overseas) | 1 to 2 | Frequently added on request |
Three design choices matter more than the exact counts. Allow the days to be taken non-consecutively within a window of one to three months, because funerals, estate matters and anniversaries do not arrive in a block. State clearly that employees may extend with PTO or unpaid leave and that requests will be granted. And give managers explicit discretion to add days for circumstances the table does not anticipate, with HR as the escalation rather than the gatekeeper.
Is Bereavement Leave Paid?
Only where the employer pays it or a state programme does. Of the states that mandate leave, California, Illinois and Oregon require job protection but not pay, though employees may use accrued vacation or sick time. Washington's child-loss leave is paid through its state fund. Everywhere else, pay is the employer's choice, and most choose to pay: Bureau of Labor Statistics benefits data has consistently shown that roughly six in ten private-sector workers, and a higher share of state and local government workers, have access to paid funeral leave, with access lowest in small firms and part-time roles.
Paid bereavement days are normally paid at the employee's regular rate for scheduled hours, are not counted as hours worked for overtime, and do not accrue or carry over, since they are granted per event rather than banked. Exempt employees must receive their full salary for any week in which they work at all, so a salaried employee who takes two bereavement days in a week cannot have those days docked regardless of whether the policy calls them paid.
Who Counts as Immediate Family?
The definition is where most bereavement disputes start. A narrow legal definition, spouse, children and parents, excludes the people many employees are closest to. Modern policies define family broadly and then let the tiers do the work.
A workable definition: spouse or domestic partner; child, including step, foster and adopted children and a child for whom the employee stands in loco parentis; parent, including step and foster parents and parents-in-law; sibling, including step and half siblings; grandparent and grandchild; and any person who lived in the employee's household. Many employers add a discretionary tier for anyone with whom the employee had a close relationship, which covers a best friend, a former guardian or a long-term partner's parent without requiring the policy to list them. Several states' statutes now include pets in sick-leave or bereavement definitions in limited ways, and some employers offer a day for the loss of a pet; it costs little and is remembered.
Documentation and Requests
Employers may ask for reasonable documentation, such as an obituary, a funeral programme or a death certificate, but should ask after the leave rather than before it and should rarely need to. California's statute allows a request for documentation within 30 days of the first day of leave and requires the employer to keep it confidential. A policy that demands a death certificate before approving a day off reads as suspicion at the worst possible moment, and the fraud it prevents is negligible.
Requests should be accepted by any means, phone, message or through a manager, with the paperwork completed later. Bereavement days should be recorded in the attendance system as approved leave, never as unexcused absence, and should be excluded from attendance point systems and performance metrics. Our guides to attendance point systems and absenteeism explain how protected and compassionate leave should be carved out of absence measures.
A Bereavement Leave Policy Template
Adapt the following to your state obligations and culture. Where a state law is more generous than any clause, the law applies.
- Purpose. The company provides paid bereavement leave so that employees can grieve, make arrangements and attend services following the death of a family member or someone close to them.
- Eligibility. All employees from the first day of employment, including part-time employees on a prorated basis.
- Entitlement. Up to five paid days following the death of a spouse or domestic partner, child, parent or parent-in-law, sibling, grandparent or grandchild, or a member of the employee's household; up to three paid days following a pregnancy loss, failed adoption or surrogacy, or fertility-treatment loss; one paid day following the death of an extended family member or close friend. Managers may approve additional paid days where travel or circumstances warrant, and HR may approve further extensions.
- Timing. Days may be taken consecutively or separately within three months of the death.
- Extension. Employees may extend bereavement leave with accrued paid time off or unpaid leave; requests will be approved.
- Pay. Paid at the regular rate for scheduled hours. Bereavement days are not hours worked for overtime purposes.
- Requests. Notify your manager or HR by any means as soon as practicable. Documentation may be requested within 30 days and will be kept confidential.
- Protection. Bereavement leave will not count against attendance standards, and no employee will be disadvantaged for taking it.
- Support. The employee assistance programme and flexible return-to-work arrangements are available; speak to your manager or HR.
- State law. Employees in California, Illinois, Oregon, Washington and Maryland receive any additional rights those states provide.
Managing Bereavement Well
The policy sets the floor; the manager sets the experience. The practices that employees remember are simple: a manager who says take what you need and means it, a workload that is actually redistributed rather than left to pile up, a check-in on return that asks how they are rather than when they will be back to normal, and flexibility in the weeks that follow, because grief is not finished when the leave is. Anniversaries, estate work and the care of a surviving parent all arrive later, and a team that has planned for reduced capacity for a month handles it better than one that expected five days to fix things.
From the operations side, the requirements are modest: record the leave correctly, keep it out of attendance metrics, and make sure nothing automated treats the absence as a problem. E-Monitor's attendance tracking distinguishes approved leave from unplanned absence and keeps the record, and its workload views help a manager see when a returning employee is overloaded. For the leave types that sit alongside this one, see floating holidays and use-it-or-lose-it vacation policies.
Related reading: Biweekly vs Semi-Monthly Pay, Fake Sick Days, What Is a Notice Period?.
Frequently Asked Questions
1. What is bereavement leave?
Paid or unpaid time off granted to an employee after the death of a family member or someone close to them, to grieve, make arrangements and attend services. No federal law requires it; a few states do, and most employers provide it by policy.
2. How many days is bereavement leave?
Typically three to five paid days for a spouse, child, parent or sibling and one day for extended family, with extensions through PTO or unpaid leave. California requires up to five days, and Illinois and Oregon up to two weeks, at covered employers.
3. Is bereavement leave paid?
Only if the employer pays it or a state programme does. California, Illinois and Oregon require job-protected but unpaid leave, with the option to use accrued paid leave. Roughly six in ten private-sector workers have access to paid funeral leave through their employer.
4. Is bereavement leave required by law?
Not federally. California (5 days, employers with 5+), Illinois (2 weeks, FMLA-covered employers), Oregon (2 weeks per death, employers with 25+) and Washington (paid days after the death of a child) require it; Maryland lets earned sick leave be used for it. Elsewhere it is employer policy.
5. Who is considered immediate family for bereavement leave?
Policies usually include spouse or domestic partner, children including step, foster and adopted, parents and parents-in-law, siblings, grandparents and grandchildren. Many add household members and give managers discretion for close friends and other relatives.
6. Can an employer ask for proof of death for bereavement leave?
Yes, reasonable documentation such as an obituary or funeral programme may be requested, usually after the leave. California allows a request within 30 days and requires confidentiality. Most employers do not require proof for short leave.
7. Does FMLA cover bereavement leave?
No. FMLA covers an employee's own serious health condition and care for a family member with one, but not time off after a death. Grief that develops into a serious health condition may qualify separately.
8. Can bereavement leave be taken non-consecutively?
Under California's law yes, within three months of the death, and good policies allow it everywhere, because funerals, estate matters and family obligations rarely fall in one block.
Leave recorded as leave, not as absence. E-Monitor's attendance tracking separates approved leave from unplanned absence and keeps the record, so bereavement never appears as an attendance problem and managers can see workload on an employee's return. 7-day free trial, no credit card. Sign up →