California AB 1949: Five Days, Covered Family, and CFRA Overlap

California AB 1949 bereavement leave gives eligible workers up to five days off after the death of a close family member, with job protection and the right to use any accrued paid time off to cover the days. The law, codified at Government Code Section 12945.7, took effect January 1, 2023 and applies to private employers with five or more employees as well as state and local public agencies.¹

Who Qualifies

Two conditions have to line up. Your employer needs five or more employees on payroll (or be a public agency), and you need to have worked there for at least 30 days before the leave begins. There’s no minimum-hours requirement beyond that tenure, and small businesses at or above the five-employee threshold get no exemption.¹

Certain state civil service employees are covered under a separate bereavement provision (Government Code Section 19859.3) and fall outside AB 1949.¹

How the Five Days Work

You get up to five days per qualifying death. The days don’t have to be consecutive, so you can use two around the funeral and three later for estate matters if that’s what you need. All five must be taken within three months of the death.¹

The statute doesn’t cap how often you can use bereavement leave over a year or a career. Each covered death triggers its own five-day entitlement. Lose a parent in February and a grandparent in October, and you’re entitled to five days for each.

Is the Leave Paid?

AB 1949 does not require the leave to be paid. Whether you receive pay depends on the policy already in place at your workplace.

If your employer offers paid bereavement leave, you use it under that policy. If the policy provides fewer than five paid days, the employer must still grant five total days, with the remaining days unpaid.
If your employer has an unpaid bereavement policy shorter than five days, it must be extended to at least five unpaid days.
If there’s no bereavement policy at all, the five days are unpaid by default.

In every scenario, you can choose to draw from any accrued paid time off you have available to cover the leave. That includes vacation, personal leave, sick leave, and compensatory time. Your employer can’t block you from using those balances.¹

Which Family Members Are Covered

The law covers the death of a spouse, domestic partner, child, parent, sibling, grandparent, grandchild, or parent-in-law.¹

Those categories are broader than they sound because the statute borrows definitions from the California Family Rights Act. “Child” covers biological, adopted, foster, and stepchildren, along with legal wards, a domestic partner’s children, and anyone you serve as a parent to. “Parent” covers biological, adoptive, foster, and stepparents, legal guardians, and anyone who acted as a parent when you were growing up. “Sibling” covers relationships by blood, adoption, or a shared legal or biological parent.²

Aunts, uncles, cousins, and close friends are not on the list. Some employers extend bereavement leave to those relationships voluntarily, but the law doesn’t require it.

Notice and Documentation

Tell your employer you need bereavement leave. The statute doesn’t require a specific amount of advance notice, which makes sense because deaths rarely give warning. Notifying your employer as soon as you reasonably can is the safest approach.

Your employer can request documentation of the death. If they do, you have 30 days from the first day of leave to provide it. Acceptable forms include a death certificate, a published obituary, or written verification from a funeral home, crematorium, religious institution, burial society, or government agency. Your employer must keep the request and any documentation confidential, sharing it only with internal personnel or legal counsel on a need-to-know basis, or where the law requires disclosure.¹

If Your Employer Denies Leave or Retaliates

It’s unlawful for an employer to interfere with, deny, or retaliate against an employee for requesting or taking bereavement leave. That means no firing, demoting, fining, suspending, or otherwise punishing you for exercising the right. The protection also covers employees who provide information or testimony in an investigation involving someone else’s bereavement leave rights.¹

Enforcement runs through the California Civil Rights Department. You have three years from the date of the violation to submit an intake form. After you file, the CRD may investigate or issue a right-to-sue notice letting you take the case to civil court. You generally can’t sue over a Fair Employment and Housing Act violation without going through the CRD first.³

How It Interacts With CFRA and FMLA

Bereavement leave under AB 1949 is a standalone entitlement. It doesn’t count against leave available under the California Family Rights Act or the federal Family and Medical Leave Act, and it doesn’t run concurrently with either. If you used 12 weeks of CFRA leave to care for a dying parent, you’re still entitled to five separate bereavement days after the parent’s death.

Grief that develops into a diagnosed mental health condition can independently qualify as a serious health condition under FMLA or CFRA, opening additional leave beyond the five days. That’s a separate clinical determination, not part of AB 1949.⁴

Reproductive Loss Leave Is a Separate Law

AB 1949 doesn’t cover miscarriage, stillbirth, failed adoption, or unsuccessful assisted reproduction. California addresses those events in a companion statute, Government Code Section 12945.6, which provides its own five days of leave on a similar structure: non-consecutive days, a three-month completion window, unpaid unless the employee uses accrued time off, and a 20-day cap if multiple reproductive loss events occur within 12 months.⁵

1
California Legislative Information. California Government Code 12945.7 – Bereavement Leave
2
California Legislative Information. California Government Code 12945.2 – California Family Rights Act
3
Civil Rights Department. Complaint Process
4
U.S. Department of Labor. Mental Health Conditions and the FMLA
5
California Legislative Information. California Government Code 12945.6 – Reproductive Loss Leave