Recent changes to the federal Employment Insurance Act, which came into effect Jan. 4, provide a new type of special EI benefit for employees with severely ill family members.

The new benefit allows up to six weeks of compassionate care benefits for employees who need time off work to provide care or support for a family member with a serious medical condition carrying with it a significant risk of death within 26 weeks.

Family members include the employee's spouse or common law partner, child or parent, or child or parent of the spouse or common law partner, or any other person defined as a "family member" in the EI Act or regulations.

The 26-week period starts with the earlier of the week in which a medical certificate signed by a medical doctor or other medical practitioner attests to the need for one or more family members to provide care or support to the ill family member, or the week a doctor examines the ill family member, or the week the family member became ill, if a doctor can determine that date.

Claimants have flexibility in how and when benefits may be claimed within the 26-week window. One person can claim all six weeks or can share the benefit with other eligible family members. Weeks of compassionate benefits can be claimed concurrently or consecutively by eligible family members.

A two-week waiting period applies for the new EI benefits. However, if compassionate care benefits are being shared by family members only the first family member claiming these benefits serves the waiting period.

More information on compassionate care benefits is available at
www.hrdc-drhc.gc.ca/ei-ae/pubs/compassionate_care.shtml.