AbsentEase
Oregon sick leave law & call-off rules
Oregon's sick time law covers every employer — paid at 10 or more employees (6+ with a Portland location), unpaid but still job-protected below that — and its covered uses run wider than most states: bereavement, new-child care, public-health closures, even blood donation as of 2026. Add one of the fastest fired-employee paycheck deadlines in the country, and Oregon terminations reward preparation. Here is what applies in 2026.
Oregon at a glance
| Paid sick leave mandate | Yes — 1 per 30, 40 hours/year; paid at 10+ employees (6+ with a Portland site) |
|---|---|
| Unpaid tier is still protected | Under-10 employers: unpaid sick time, but points and discipline are equally barred |
| Covered uses | Unusually broad — includes bereavement, new-child care, and weather/PHE closures |
| Doctor's notes | Only past 3 consecutive scheduled workdays (with narrow exceptions) |
| PTO payout at termination | Policy controls — a promised payout is enforceable through BOLI |
| Final paycheck deadline | Fired: end of the next business day · Quit: varies with notice given |
| Meal & rest breaks | Required — 30-minute meal at 6+ hours, paid 10-minute rest per 4-hour segment |
Is paid sick leave required in Oregon?
Yes. Under ORS 653.601–661, employees accrue 1 hour of sick time per 30 hours worked from day one (usable after 90 days), capped at 40 hours of accrual and use per year with an 80-hour bank. At employers with 10+ employees — or 6+ if the company has any City of Portland location — the time is paid; smaller employers may keep it unpaid, but it is equally protected either way. The state law preempts local sick-time ordinances, so there's one standard.
How Oregon's sick leave law works
| Accrual rate | 1 hour per 30 hours worked (front-loading 40 hours satisfies the law) |
|---|---|
| Paid vs. unpaid | Paid at 10+ employees (6+ with a Portland location); unpaid but job-protected below |
| Caps | 40 hours accrual and use per year; 80-hour total bank |
| Covered uses | Own or family illness and mental health, preventive care, new-child care within 12 months, bereavement, safe leave, public-health closures and evacuation orders — and blood donation from 2026 |
| Doctor's notes | Only when an absence exceeds 3 consecutive scheduled workdays, notice rules were broken, or there's evidence of abuse — and the employer covers the cost if the employee isn't yet benefits-eligible |
| Call-in procedure | For unforeseeable leave, employees can be held to your usual call-in procedure — a genuine lever most mandate states don't offer |
The anti-retaliation rule: ORS 653.641 prohibits retaliation for sick-time use, and BOLI's rules treat counting a qualifying absence in a no-fault points system as unlawful — protected absences cannot be the basis for discipline, at any employer size, paid or unpaid.
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 Oregon
Oregon is at-will, and no-call no-shows outside the protected categories can be disciplined normally — in fact Oregon gives employers a lever most mandate states don't: for unforeseeable sick leave, employees can be required to follow your usual call-in procedure. The catch is the breadth of what counts as protected: a call-off for a funeral, a new baby, a school closed by an evacuation order, or a mental-health day is sick time under ORS 653.616, and none of it can generate points — even at a five-person shop where the time is unpaid. BOLI enforces on records, and the wide use-list means classification errors are the main exposure. A call-off hotline or text-based call-off system that captures the stated reason verbatim, at the moment of the call-off, is what keeps the sorting honest and provable.
PTO payout and final paychecks
| Scenario | Rule | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Employee is fired or laid off | All earned wages due by the end of the first business day after termination | ORS 652.140 |
| Employee quits with 48+ hours' notice | Due on the final working day | ORS 652.140 |
| Employee quits without notice | Due within 5 business days or the next regular payday, whichever comes first | ORS 652.140 |
| Late payment penalty | Willful lateness accrues penalty wages — up to 30 days' pay | ORS 652.150 |
The next-business-day rule after a firing is easy to miss when payroll runs biweekly — build final-pay processing into the termination decision itself. See how PTO accrual works.
Leave Oregon employers must (and must not) provide
| Leave type | Required? | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Sick time | Yes | Paid at 10+/6+ employees; protected at every size |
| Meal & rest breaks | Yes | Unpaid 30-minute duty-free meal at 6+ hours; paid 10-minute rest per 4-hour segment, near the middle |
| Jury duty | Yes — unpaid | You can't force vacation or sick leave onto jury days, and 10+ employee firms must continue health insurance during service |
| Voting | No | Oregon has voted by mail since 2000 — no time-off requirement |
| Military | Yes | USERRA (federal) plus Oregon National Guard protections |
The Oregon 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 state-protected sick time or FMLA/ADA territory gets a different track than an overslept alarm.
Comparing states? See all published guides on the state sick leave laws hub.