Benefits | Pregnancy Loss and Fertility Leave | Application Procedures

• An employee seeking to avail of this leave provision within this policy for pregnancy loss should inform their line manager as soon as is practicable of the need to take this leave. The leave provision is in place to support an employee taking time off during or in the immediate aftermath of a pregnancy loss. 
• The employee is asked to provide a letter or certificate from their GP/consultant/clinic confirming the pregnancy loss. This can be submitted to the DCU People Helpdesk. When submitting, select the Sick Leave category to ensure your request is routed to the right expert quickly and sensitively. To protect your privacy, DCU People utilise Private Groups for strict data separation. Your documentation will be held securely and confidentially on file in full compliance with GDPR and data protection guidelines.
• The employee should indicate how many days leave they require, with the policy offering a maximum of 10 days paid leave. There is no expectation for the employee to avail of the full leave entitlement if they do not wish to. 
• The employee’s personnel record will be updated confidentially to reflect this leave, and it will sit separately to the employee’s sick leave balance. 
• If additional days are required, an employee may seek to use other leave entitlements including annual leave, sick leave or leave of absence.

• An employee seeking to avail of this leave provision within the policy for fertility treatment should agree the period of leave with their line manager, giving as much notice as possible. 
• A letter or certificate from your fertility clinic/consultant should be provided to DCU People at the commencement of your treatment cycle. This can be submitted to the DCU People Helpdesk. When submitting, select the Sick Leave category to ensure your request is routed to the right expert quickly and sensitively. To protect your privacy, DCU People utilise Private Groups for strict data separation. Your documentation will be held securely and confidentially on file in full compliance with GDPR and data protection guidelines.
• In cases where more than one fertility cycle needs to be undertaken, a letter or certificate should be provided for each new cycle. 
• Once the letter or certificate has been received, DCU People Services will update your Core Portal with the option to request Fertility Leave. A balance of 10 days will be added to your Core, per fertility cycle. An employee does not have to avail of the full ten days if they do not require it. Once fertility treatment has concluded, if any leave days are unused, please inform DCU People so that the unused days can be removed from the employee’s balance. 
• Employees may request leave through their Core Portal, and this should be approved by their line manager. Up to 10 days of fertility leave are available per cycle. The policy does not specify a limit to the number of cycles an employee may request leave for as we acknowledge that fertility journeys vary in length and number of treatments required. However, the total fertility leave available to an employee is capped at 30 days across their employment, meaning once 30 days have been used (whether from three full cycles or a combination of partial cycles), no further fertility leave will be available.
• If additional days are required, an employee may seek to use other leave entitlements including annual leave, sick leave or leave of absence. For example, if an employee is undergoing a medical procedure this can be treated as sick leave as per the sick leave policy once medically certified.

How the 30-day maximum works in practice

An employee can request fertility leave for as many treatment cycles as they need, there's no cap on the number of cycles. However, the total amount of fertility leave available across an employee's entire employment is capped at 30 days.

Example 1:

• Cycle 1: Employee takes 10 days → 10 days used, 20 days remaining
• Cycle 2: Employee takes 10 days → 20 days used, 10 days remaining
• Cycle 3: Employee takes 10 days → 30 days used, 0 days remaining

Example 2: 

• Cycle 1: Employee takes 5 days → 5 days used, 25 days remaining
• Cycle 2: Employee takes 10 days → 15 days used, 15 days remaining
• Cycle 3: Employee takes 5 days → 20 days used, 10 days remaining
• Cycle 4: Employee takes 5 days → 25 days used, 5 days remaining
• Cycle 5: Employee takes 5 days → 30 days used, 0 days remaining