Minnesota Paid Leave | AbsenceSoft Documentation

Overview

Starting January 1, 2026, Minnesota introduces its paid leave program, providing wage replacement and job protection for qualifying employees.

What's new: Minnesota employees can receive paid benefits and job protection for various qualifying family and medical leave reasons, including pregnancy, bonding, medical leave, family caregiving, safe leave, care of injured servicemember, and qualifying exigency.

For detailed legislative requirements, see our Legislative Guidance.

How to Use

Throughout this guidance, look for these labels to quickly identify what actions may be needed:

Automatic: System handles this automatically, no action needed

Manual Action or Tracking Required: User must complete this action or track elsewhere

Configuration Note: How the policy is set up in the platform

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Best Practice: AbsenceSoft recommendation for optimal management

How AbsenceSoft Manages Minnesota Paid Leave

AbsenceSoft uses two separate policies that work together to provide Minnesota Paid Leave benefits:

Policy Name	Policy Code	Policy Type	Purpose
Minnesota Paid Leave	MN-PL	Paid Leave	Provides wage replacement during qualifying leave
Minnesota Paid Leave - Job Protection	MN-PL-JP	Job Protection	Protects employee's position during leave

Configuration Note: These policies run concurrently and are automatically applied to new qualifying cases starting January 1, 2026.

Administration Options

Minnesota Paid Leave can be administered through:

State Plan (default) through the Department of Employment and Economic Development
Private Plans (fully or self-insured) requiring custom policies

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Best Practice: Private fully and self-insured plans should disable the core policies and create custom policies to track separately.

Employer Coverage Requirements

Excluded Employers

All Minnesota employers are covered except:

Federal government
Tribal nations

Configuration Note: AbsenceSoft's policy applies to all Minnesota employees by default.

Manual Action Required: Manually override eligibility for employees of excluded employers.

Employee Eligibility

Work State Requirements

Employees must work or reside in Minnesota at least 50% of the year(without working 50%+ in any one state) and meet minimum wage requirements. Job-protected leave requires at least 90 calendar days of employment.

Configuration Note: AbsenceSoft's policy is configured to apply to employees with Work State = Minnesota.

Manual Action Required: Manually override eligibility for:

Employees without Minnesota work state but who reside there 50%+ of the time
Employees with Minnesota work state who don't actually work/reside there 50%+ of the time

Earnings Requirements

Employees must have earned at least 5.3% of the state's average annual wage in the base period.

Manual Action Required: Override eligibility to ineligible for employees who have not met this earnings requirement based on the state’s determination for ineligibility.

Eligibility Exceptions

Excluded Employees - Self-Employed and Independent Contractors

Self-employed individuals and independent contractors are excluded but may opt into the program.

Manual Action Required: Manually override eligibility for excluded employees who have not opted into the program.

Excluded Employees - Seasonal Hospitality Workers

Seasonal hospitality workers employed for 150 calendar days or less during any consecutive 52-week period are excluded.

Manual Action Required: Manually override eligibility for employees who do not meet the employee coverage requirements.

Qualifying Family Members

Special Family Relationship Requirements

De Facto Custodian:

Configuration Note: AbsenceSoft does not have a relationship for 'De Facto Custodian'. Users should select:

Legal Ward in place of this relationship for a child
Legal Guardian in place of this relationship for a parent

Individual with Care Relationship:

An individual who has a relationship with the applicant that creates an expectation and reliance that the applicant cares for the individual, whether or not they reside together.

Configuration Note: AbsenceSoft does not have this relationship available. Users should select "Individual Dependent on Employee for Care" in place of this relationship.

Leave Entitlements and Duration

Entitlement Overview

Absence Reason Category	Entitlement	Period
Medical Leave (Employee Health Condition + Pregnancy/Maternity)	Up to 12 weeks	12 months
Family Leave (Bonding, Adoption/Foster Care, Family Health Condition, Care of Injured Servicemember, Qualifying Exigency, Safe Leave, Domestic Violence)	Up to 12 weeks	12 months
Combined Maximum (all reasons)	20 weeks	12 months

Automatic: AbsenceSoft automatically calculates entitlement based on the above overview when using core policies.

Entitlement Rules

Pregnancy and Bonding Cases

Pregnancy (12 weeks from Medical Leave pool) and Bonding (12 weeks from Family Leave pool) have separate, non-shared allocations.

Manual Action Required: If Bonding is requested in association with a Pregnancy/Maternity case, the bonding portion must be submitted as a separate case with a Bonding absence reason so entitlement is calculated properly.

A workflow will generate a todo upon case creation of a pregnancy/maternity case that reminds the user to create a separate bonding case if applicable. This generates for employees in work state Minnesota for new cases that start on or after 1/1/2026.

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Best Practice:

Create the bonding case without delay if needed to ensure it does not get missed.
Communicate this requirement clearly to employees requesting both pregnancy and bonding leave.

Manual Action Required: When the Bonding case is created, eligibility may need to be overridden to match the eligibility status as of the start of the pregnancy case. This is only needed if the bonding case immediately follows the pregnancy case.

Bonding Leave Timing

Bonding leave must be taken within 12 months of birth, adoption, or placement, except in the case where the child must remain in the hospital longer than the mother—in that case, the leave must end within 12 months after the child leaves the hospital.

Manual Action Required: Users will need to manually track the end of the bonding period to ensure it falls within the designated timeframe.

How Leave Can Be Taken

Intermittent Leave Hours Limit Option

Employers may limit intermittent leave to 480 hours in any 12-month period. Employees may take any remaining leave continuously.

Manual Action Required: Employers who wish to take this approach will be required to track entitlement manually.

Pay and Benefits

Elimination Period Requirements

Elimination Periods for Intermittent Leaves

Claims must be at least 7 calendar days to qualify for payment, except for bonding claims. The days must be consecutive, unless the leave is intermittent.

Manual Action Required: Intermittent requests must be manually denied for the Minnesota Paid Leave policy due to Elimination Period until they fulfill the first 7 full days of requests. Once the 7 days are met, the requests can be approved retroactively.

The waiting period does not apply to the Minnesota Paid Leave - Job Protection policy.

Payment Requirements

Intermittent Leave Payments

For intermittent leaves, payment is applicable after a cumulative 8 hours within a 30-day period.

Tracking Required: Users are required to track this threshold manually.

Benefit Period

Standard Benefit Period

The benefit period covers 52 calendar weeks beginning the effective date of leave.

Benefit Period Exception

For an effective date of leave that falls on January 1, April 1, July 1, or October 1, the benefit year will be a period of 53 calendar weeks.

External Tracking Required: AbsenceSoft can only provide a consistent 52-week benefit period across the board. For employees that require a 53-week benefit period, follow the state's decision for adjudicating time used and time available.

Required Paperwork

Configuration Note: AbsenceSoft has core paperwork configured to support the law’s notice of Employee Rights under Minnesota Paid Leave for these policies. Paperwork is configured to be sent with the Employee Eligibility packet.

Manual Action Required: Customers with customized communications may need to adjust their configurations to include this paperwork.

Platform Workflow & Required Actions

Identifying Qualifying Cases

Automatic: The platform automatically identifies qualifying cases starting January 1, 2026 based on:

Work State = Minnesota

Qualifying absence reason

Employee eligibility criteria met

Earnings requirements met

Adding Minnesota Paid Leave Policies

Automatic: Both policies are automatically added to new cases with qualifying absence reasons starting on or after January 1, 2026:

Minnesota Paid Leave
Minnesota Paid Leave - Job Protection

Manual Action Required: For cases with excluded employees(exemptions), manually add, remove, or override eligibility for policies as needed.

Managing In-Flight Cases

Cases Spanning January 1, 2026

For leaves that began before but continue after January 1, 2026, manual intervention is required.

Manual Action Required: Review all active Minnesota cases to identify those that:

Were open before January 1, 2026

Continue on or after January 1, 2026

Meet qualifying criteria for Minnesota Paid Leave

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Best Practice: Proactively communicate with employees about their new benefit eligibility. Many may not be aware.

Tracking Required: Create a list of all potentially eligible in-flight cases before January 1, 2026 to ensure none are missed.

In-Flight Cases: Standard Absence Reasons

Qualifying Absence Reasons

Adoption/Foster Care
Bonding
Employee Health Condition
Family Health Condition
Care of Injured Servicemember
Qualifying Exigency
Safe Leave
Domestic Violence
Pregnancy without Bonding

Re-adjudication Instructions (Effective 1/1/2026)

For cases that are open and span 1/1/2026:

Manual Action Required:

Manually add the Minnesota Paid Leave policy (if applicable/eligibility criteria is met)

Manually add the Minnesota Paid Leave - Job Protection policy (if applicable/eligibility criteria is met)

Both policies should start on 1/1/2026

Send MN Paid Leave paperwork to employee

Documentation Requirements

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Best Practice: Document in case notes:

"Minnesota Paid Leave added retroactively for in-flight case effective 1/1/2026"

In-Flight Cases: Pregnancy with Bonding

Legislative Distinction

The Pregnancy absence reason does not share its 12-week entitlement with the 12 weeks of entitlement for the Bonding absence reason for Minnesota Paid Leave.

Manual Action Required: If bonding leave is requested in correlation with pregnancy leave, they must be submitted as separate cases so entitlement can be allocated properly.

Example 1: Bonding Starts On or After 1/1/2026

Scenario:

Employee has a Pregnancy/Maternity case that also requests Bonding
Case is still open and spans 1/1/2026
Bonding is scheduled to start on or AFTER 1/1/2026

Instructions (Effective 1/1/2026):

For Existing Pregnancy/Maternity Case:

Perform a case change to end this case the day before bonding is scheduled to begin
Manually add the Minnesota Paid Leave policy (if applicable/eligibility criteria is met)
Manually add the Minnesota Paid Leave - Job Protection policy (if applicable/eligibility criteria is met)
Both policies should start on 1/1/2026
Send MN Paid Leave paperwork to employee

For New Bonding Case:

Create a new Bonding case that starts on the scheduled bonding start date
Minnesota Paid Leave policies should automatically be applied to this new case

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Best Practice: Document the split clearly in both case notes, explaining the separate entitlement allocations.

Example 2: Bonding Starts Before 1/1/2026

Scenario:

Employee has a Pregnancy/Maternity case that also requests Bonding
Case is still open and spans 1/1/2026
Bonding is scheduled to start BEFORE 1/1/2026

Instructions (Effective 1/1/2026):

For Existing Pregnancy/Maternity Case:

Perform a case change to end this case on 12/31/2025

For New Bonding Case:

Create a new Bonding case that starts on 1/1/2026
Minnesota Paid Leave policies should automatically be applied to this new case

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Best Practice: Document the split clearly in both case notes, explaining the separate entitlement allocations.

Need Help?

For questions about policy configuration or case management, contact your AbsenceSoft support team or consult the Legislative Guidance for compliance details.