AbsentEase
Montana sick leave law & call-off rules
Montana has no sick leave mandate — and that's the least interesting thing about it, because Montana is the only state that isn't at-will. After the default 12-month probationary period, discharge requires good cause under the Wrongful Discharge from Employment Act, and materially skipping your own handbook's discipline steps is itself wrongful discharge. In Montana, the attendance policy isn't just protection — it's the legal foundation of every termination. Here is what applies in 2026.
Montana at a glance
| Paid sick leave mandate | None — and no local ordinances |
|---|---|
| Employment relationship | NOT at-will after probation — good cause required (WDEA) |
| Probation | 12 months by default, extendable to 18 before it expires |
| Your own handbook | Materially skipping its steps is independently actionable |
| Vacation at termination | Earned wages — forfeiture prohibited; reasonable accrual caps allowed |
| Final paycheck (fired) | Immediately (within 4 hours or end of business day) — unless a written policy extends to next payday/15 days |
| Meal & rest breaks | None at any age |
Is paid sick leave required in Montana?
No sick leave mandate — no accrual, no caps, no local ordinances. But accrued vacation, once offered, is treated as wages that cannot be forfeited at separation, and every attendance decision after probation runs through the WDEA's good-cause requirement below.
How the WDEA changes attendance terminations
| Probation | Default 12 months from hire (extendable before expiry to 18 max); during it, discharge for any lawful reason |
|---|---|
| After probation | Discharge requires good cause: reasonable job-related grounds — unsatisfactory performance, disruption of operations, or another legitimate business reason (not false, whimsical, arbitrary, or capricious) |
| Your own policy binds you | A material violation of the employer's own written policy that deprives the employee of a fair shot at keeping the job is itself wrongful discharge |
| Grievance procedures | If you have a written internal procedure, you must supply it to the discharged employee, and they must exhaust it before suing |
| Exposure | Up to 4 years of lost wages and benefits (offset by interim income) |
What this means for attendance: a documented, written, consistently applied attendance policy — with its warning steps actually followed — is the textbook "legitimate business reason." A points termination with fuzzy records, skipped steps, or uneven enforcement is the textbook WDEA claim.
The federal floor that still applies
FMLA
Employers with 50+ employees within 75 miles must give eligible employees (12+ months tenure, 1,250+ hours in the past year) up to 12 weeks of unpaid, job-protected leave for a serious health condition — their own or a close family member's. FMLA-protected absences can't accrue attendance points, and a call-off that mentions an ongoing condition can be notice enough to trigger your FMLA obligations, even if the employee never says "FMLA."
ADA
For employers with 15+ employees, the ADA can require modified attendance expectations or unpaid leave as a reasonable accommodation for a disability. An attendance policy applied "no exceptions" is exactly the kind that loses ADA cases — build an accommodation carve-out into the policy itself.
Call-offs, no-call no-shows, and firing in Montana
Montana inverts the national default: past 12 months, "we're at-will" is not a defense, and every attendance termination must stand up as good cause. The good news for disciplined employers is that the WDEA explicitly blesses what a well-run call-off system produces — reasonable, job-related, documented grounds applied through your own stated process. The failure modes are equally specific: firing on a supervisor's recollection instead of records, skipping a warning step the handbook promises, or enforcing points unevenly across a crew. Wage claims go to the Department of Labor & Industry; WDEA claims go to court with up to four years of wages on the table. A call-off hotline or text-based call-off system is closer to mandatory here than anywhere — it's the evidence that good cause existed.
PTO payout and final paychecks
| Scenario | Rule | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Employee is fired | Immediately — end of that business day or within 4 hours — unless a written personnel policy extends it to the next payday or 15 days, whichever is first | Mont. Code 39-3-205 |
| Employee quits | Next regular payday or within 15 days, whichever occurs first | Mont. Code 39-3-205 |
| Unused vacation | Earned wages — must be paid at separation; use-it-or-lose-it at termination is prohibited | Montana wage law |
| Late payment | Penalties up to 110% of wages due | Mont. Code 39-3-206 |
Adopt the written policy extending final pay to the next payday — without it, every firing is a same-day payroll event. See how PTO accrual works.
Leave Montana employers must (and must not) provide
| Leave type | Required? | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Jury duty | Protected in practice | No dedicated private-sector statute — but a jury-service firing would be a WDEA public-policy discharge; federal jurors protected by federal law |
| Military | Yes | USERRA (federal) plus Montana National Guard protections |
| Voting | No | No voting-leave statute |
| Sick leave | No | Whatever your written policy provides |
| Meal & rest breaks | No | None required at any age |
The Montana employer's attendance playbook
- Put it in writing. A written policy — call-off deadline and channel, points or steps, the no-call no-show rule, and carve-outs for legally protected absences — is what makes discipline defensible. Our attendance policy guide walks through it.
- Give call-offs one channel. "Tell whoever answers" is how records get lost. One number every employee texts or calls makes the record automatic.
- Log everything with timestamps. Unemployment hearings and discrimination charges are won on contemporaneous records, not recollections.
- Enforce consistently. Uneven enforcement converts a lawful termination into a discrimination claim.
- Screen call-offs for protected reasons before applying points — sickness that could be FMLA/ADA territory gets a different track than an overslept alarm.
Comparing states? See all published guides on the state sick leave laws hub.