purpose of the act with twofold it was to balance the demands of the workplace with the need the family to promote the stability and economic purity of family and to promote the national interest improve in preserving family integrity and to accomplish these purposes in a manner that accommodates the legitimate interests of employers in this appeal we question that the employer has a legitimate interest in its action in terminating this maracas from what we all understand to be legitimate medical family medical leave i'm going to confine my arguments to the absences that occurred on june fourth through can tick two thousand and one even though there were other apps is that work she was terminated for but we're only confine our arguments to the particular day question is does a does an employer have a legitimate interest in terminating an employee on family medical leave without warning without program discipline that contemplated in the regulations and without even in four years whether there were first extenuating circumstances that would warrant an extension beyond the minimum fifteen days that a person have to submit a medical service occasion in the regulation i'll start first with  argument in brief today and that is does an employer have to provide all of the anticipated questions i'll be anticipated consequences when it warns an employer of the consequences of a failure  medical sort of the cation in the district court's opinion the court of the employer is not obligated to provide all of the quote unquote downstream consequences the regulation doesn't talk about subsection be one in that regulation it says that the employer shall also provide the employee with a written note it detailing the specific expectations and obligation of the employee and explaining any consequences of a failure fired if you don't get this stuff it wasn't by not being f l m f f m l a leave then it was whatever leave she was afforded under the collective bargaining agreement with boeing and for that there was a there was a obligation to anticipate the consequences of that for ms maracas it's not the employees obligation to anticipate what an employer may or may not do but when she previously been given a warning that she was there she was up against the legal limit she ha failure to meet these obligations and that regulation goes on to actually talk about section eight two five three or five so we have anticipated consequences and we have any consequences that doesn't mean first level or that means any all that the employer had to do in that case was put in the warning notice that if you are in debt to the the program the discipline you will be subject to terminations it wouldn't be that hard not unduly burdensome for an employer to amend a warning notice to comply with the purpose of the then next regulation a two five three one one and there's two essentially two argument to be made on this regard i'm going to start first with the with the progress of discipline issues i think this is really the heart of the case and what really should have happened here a two five three one one be required that it's the employee that the employer must fill out the fifteen days after the employee requested or give that service cation and as soon as reasonably possible under the particular facts and circumstances if the employee fail to provide medical certification within a reasonable time and under the burden partner's circumstances the employer may delay the employee use intermittent effluent leave either for her own medical condition or her daughter's medical condition it simply terminated her the intermediate penalty that contemplated by the regulations is that if you don't get your medical certification and you forfeit your few five three o five what happens if an employer find that a medical certification is incomplete if then it would certainly be at most an incomplete or deficient medical certification  of rocket backs give her a reasonable time to cure instead it's just an add on to the argument that we could have fired her at any time that was blowing obligated to wait until october to see whether she wouldn't come up with the boeing with obligated on july never become president well we're not that's not the issue today and i and i'm glad i don't have to answer that might be better but i will answer it i don't need i would say that that would be dicked in any decision though because it doesn't go to our case i would say case if the the because i don't employ cannot fill out a medical certification on our own she is relying on medical providers the circumstances surrounding what the medical provider did or didn't do become  an issue in whether what's reasonable in the circumstances in this case is a reasonable under the circumstances that the doctor loses the forms then is rocket be given another medical certification to take back the doctor and have a fill out the purpose of the  balance the need for legitimate need of ms maracas against the legitimate demands of the employer would require that the employer simply give her another medical certification to fill out and have to return it then we know that a person who was out on at  office and say oh my gosh i can't believe i call the doctor's office but lock the form i'll get it to you don't don't quire me ok and that waiting until october three months after she's been fired for months after she's been fired and then show up with a form that doesn't look like it conforms to fired for six different after those jobs are under terminations for her first recourse is not to go to h r it's to go to a union so she have to work with her union and figure out what to do next you have to go through the grievance process that's the way that they do  it within the labor management organization in this case she has to figure out exactly what these days where actually you know there was some confusion with her with their union rep you know what chapters or which because she's a mom she's a mom she's got a seven year old daughter broke her arm she's got a son who's this she's got her own medical condition she's worried about she's running all over town trying to get these medical certifications then she's working hard to do it that it took this long really doesn't matter because she did ultimately get it in she didn't i mean it did we can say that she never got the medical service and then and going didn't ask her to do that boy was there anything in boeing terminated notice of her that would have alerted the problem was the believe that she didn't account for it and you know it just says that she's got six different part time i believe nine different applications that she was off that that were seen to be on that factory  point them is there anything in the record that indicates what point she realized the doctor sworn had come in know that side of the record acted with due diligence in obtaining her certification from boeing taking it to a doctor and having her doctor and request their doctor back then that the normal procedure and there's no reason why maracas shouldn't expect at least something a reminder if she testified that her supervisor would give her the heads up hey we didn't get your medical certification you need to get that in right away that's all that needed to happen we could have saved the twenty year job perhaps a million dollars in future wages for this person if she does you know these are these are the best jobs for laborers in in the northwest that have a huge impact on her family for her to lose a job at boeing is a huge deal for her family the security of her or her family is that they fear because boeing didn't have a face to face or a phone call in person contact at all to tell her that there was a problem but all that needed to be done w that the balance between the needs of the family and the demand and the result demands of the employer really rap on that particular issue boeing could have given her a warning a heads off to let her know that that there was a deficiency and it should have applied buner media penalty of telling her hey you're not going to be able to use the leave until such time that we see this sort of occasion and if you never get it in or if you don't get it in i don't know if we want to enter but it's never to be a month or ninety days staff limitations i had that doesn't matter i think because boeing didn't even go there it just simply terminator the adverse action occurred on july seventeenth when she was terminated question when this miraculous larned that the paperwork and not gotten it i think doesn't counsel said that that was not clear on the record in fact it is clear on the record if you were to turn to exercise record page forty two which is page sixty seven up in this market stuff is the issue and i asked the question when was the first time you learned that boeing had not received the medical certification from your doctor answer when i was terminated so i think i would submit that it's undisputed in the a number of times by the one company for attendance problems and in particular in october two thousand she received the first step of progressive discipline which is a written warning for a number of an excuse asses then in january of zero one she received a one day suspension which  all she understood that it's not very complicated and she did understand that so the jumping ahead of myself a little bit here but the argument that she the following did not properly inform her of the consequences of not turning in  different paths you might say one is that if the employee fails to provide the medical certification within a reasonable time the employer may delay the employee's continuation of s n l e and if the employee never produces a certification to leave is not that the employer would have the right to delay continuation of the leave but in a case like this any in fact any leibowitz less than fifteen days you do the math and it would leave the employer essentially without a remedy because was no she didn't come back when she indisputably learned of the failure of the doctor's office to provide the medical certification of terminations day she didn't immediately come back with the certification and i think from her there was no communication to boeing shortly after that time right in other words she didn't bring much she didn't bring the medical certification it so it comes and months later and it's got the name of a different doctor and it's of warning our information that she got at the time she requested to leave as to what the consequences would be if she didn't return the medical certification and what the notice she got is that it would not be counted  essentially when you know how many an excuse days there are for instance that you know whether it's going to leave determination or not it's possible to find insist she was only out for a day or two instead of three that it would have been grounds for  termination i mean our facts are a little bit funky that way but if a court order to impose a new requirement on employers that they had to in that s m l a documentation for an employer explain whether it's going to be a terminations or not at the time the employee request leave i think that would be not only something that is beyond what stated in the regulations but wholly impractical because in many instances the employee employer at that point time would not know itself exactly what the consequences are because it the requirement of the stated requirement that you must return a medical certification form and the form itself and i think the record reflect she think she got that on the eighth or ninth in the mail so that was the absences so it's a little bit inaccurate to think that because that this was just out of the blue and her terminations based strictly on this and i guess a come back to the notion that the regulations and the statute are quite clear in placing the responsibility for returning the medical certificate ation on the employer him or herself we were the policy makers we might decide that there should be a different rule perhaps it should be the responsibility of the employer to track down that medical certification perhaps it should be the responsibility of the health care provider but for whatever reasons congress place was sponsibility on the employee that's clear conclude that it was returned as soon as reasonably practical thereafter when it was we believe never provided but if you count the october two thousand linus as a temp that it was still four months after the fact blanche we're suggesting that that three o five has a two parts one is the minimum fifteen days and the other is reasonable under the circumstances we are suggesting that the employer simply has an obligation to inquire if there are extenuating circumstances before deciding where that one is not boeing's responsibility because they have to apply the policy they're the ones in the power to decide that they're going to be consequences  forty two days and an hour in this rocket go right now to your doctor and get the certification for ninety days completely arbitrary he's been given she's given given a fifteen day think harbor or or reasonable under the under the circumstances  relying on in three eleven does apply to an forseeable leap now intermittent leave occurs over periods of time she had a serious medical condition for over a year she took it before and she took it after disingenuous to say that that her leave could not would not be continuing absolutely it would be continuing take for example person who is on intermittent leave for kidney dialysis is going every week for a ballasted that would still be intermittent leave the regulation would apply in three eleven b would apply to that person and the why would a person who will take the example what if ms maracas and daughter had a more serious injury than a broken arm and she was out in the hospital for an extended period of time say twenty days after the fifteen day bowings the remedy would be to have ms rocket come back to work until she got a proof of cation of her daughter's illness why would a person with a less tyria injury who's actually less of a burden on the employer be treated better then in that case we need to treat the people with the shorter term injury or leave just as we would a person with a longer there's no reason to treat somebody without a little bit longer better that person gets get to keep their job in this morocco's loses her that doesn't make any sense the the way to interpret three eleven is say that continue to leave it's just your ability to take continued leave you still have a serious medical condition think both council and maracas versus boeing will be submitted