What paid family and sick leave does Washington require in 2026?
Three stacked programmes apply to your Washington payroll: Paid Family & Medical Leave at a 1.13% premium with up to 16 weeks of benefit, paid sick leave accruing 1 hour per 40 hours worked, and the WA Cares long-term-care fund. Federal FMLA holds the job; the state pays the wages.
· Washington, United States guide
Illustration · Seattle, Washington
Washington is one of the heaviest paid-leave states in the country. Three programmes stack on every employer: statewide Paid Family & Medical Leave funded by a 1.13% payroll premium, paid sick leave that accrues from the first hour worked, and the WA Cares long-term-care fund. Compare that with California's leave stack or Oregon's to see how Washington's combined premium sits.
If you run a national FMLA-only policy in Washington, you are short from day one. PFML pays up to 90% of wages for as much as 16 weeks, and sick leave has no headcount threshold at all. Federal FMLA only decides who holds the job while the state writes the cheque.
What paid leave must Washington employers provide?
Three state programmes apply on top of federal law: Paid Family & Medical Leave (PFML), paid sick leave, and the WA Cares Fund.
PFML and paid sick leave reach every employer from the first Washington hire, with no 50-employee threshold. WA Cares is an employee-paid long-term-care premium that you withhold and remit on the same payroll run.
| Programme | What it provides | Who pays in 2026 |
|---|---|---|
| Paid Family & Medical Leave | Up to 16 weeks of paid leave, up to 90% wage replacement | 1.13% premium; employer 28.57% / employee 71.43% at 50+ staff |
| Paid sick leave | 1 hour accrued per 40 hours worked | Employer-funded; no premium |
| WA Cares Fund | Long-term-care benefit | 0.58% of wages, employee-paid, no cap |
| Federal FMLA (floor) | 12 weeks unpaid, job protected | Unpaid; applies at 50+ employees |
The assumption that catches out-of-state employers is the 50-employee floor. Federal FMLA hits at 50 employees, but Washington PFML and paid sick leave apply from your first Washington hire. A three-person Seattle team carries the same PFML premium and sick-leave accrual as a 3,000-person enterprise. Review the full cost picture with the employer cost calculator before you commit to a headcount.
How does Washington Paid Family & Medical Leave work in 2026?
WA PFML gives eligible employees up to 12 weeks of medical leave and 12 weeks of family leave, capped at 16 weeks combined in a claim year, rising to 18 weeks with a pregnancy-related serious health condition.
The 2026 premium is 1.13% of gross wages up to the Social Security cap of $184,500. Employers with 50 or more employees pay 28.57% of that premium and employees pay 71.43%.
The benefit replaces up to 90% of an employee's average weekly wage for lower earners, on a sliding scale, up to a weekly maximum the state resets each year. Washington's Employment Security Department pays the benefit directly, so your payroll runs unchanged through the leave. That is a meaningful difference from states where you fund short-term disability yourself.
Small employers with fewer than 50 employees do not pay the employer share of the premium, but they still collect and remit the employee share. Eligibility runs on an hours-worked test in the qualifying period rather than the federal tenure rule, so a worker can qualify for PFML wage replacement before they are FMLA-eligible. For comparison, see how Oregon's Paid Leave Oregon structures its qualifying hours and employer contributions.
| PFML dimension | 2026 rule |
|---|---|
| Medical leave | Up to 12 weeks per claim year |
| Family leave | Up to 12 weeks per claim year |
| Combined cap | 16 weeks, or 18 with pregnancy-related incapacity |
| Premium | 1.13% of wages to $184,500 |
| Wage replacement | Up to 90%, sliding scale |
How much paid sick leave does Washington require?
Every Washington employee accrues paid sick leave at 1 hour for every 40 hours worked, with no employer-size threshold and no waiting period to begin accruing.
Accrual starts on the first day of work, and unused sick time carries over year to year. The rule comes from Initiative 1433, codified at RCW 49.46.210.
Covered uses are broad: your employee's own illness, care for a family member, and safe time related to domestic violence, sexual assault or stalking. Washington's L&I paid sick leave guidance shows the family definition reaches beyond the federal one, so the same hours cover a wider set of caregiving situations than an FMLA policy would.
Three cities run their own paid-sick-leave ordinances on top of the state floor: Seattle, SeaTac and Tacoma. Where a city rule is more generous on a specific point, that rule applies. A national policy that accrues less than 1 hour per 40 worked is short on every Washington payroll, before any city overlay. Washington's wage and overtime rules sit alongside sick leave as the two floors your payroll must clear from day one.
What is the WA Cares Fund and who pays for it?
WA Cares is a state long-term-care insurance programme funded by an employee-paid premium of 0.58% of wages, with no wage cap and no employer match.
You withhold and remit it; you do not contribute to it. Premiums have been collected since 2023 and benefits became available in July 2026.
WA Cares is not leave you design, but it is a Washington payroll line you administer. It funds a lifetime long-term-care benefit for workers who have paid in long enough. For your payroll, the work is the 0.58% withholding and remittance on the same run as the PFML premium. Washington's WA Cares Fund site publishes the current rate and exemption rules. Employees who had private long-term-care insurance before November 2021 may have applied for an exemption; if they did, you stop withholding for them. Get the Washington state tax and unemployment insurance picture alongside WA Cares to see every payroll line on one screen.
How does federal FMLA interact with Washington leave?
Federal FMLA gives up to 12 weeks of unpaid, job-protected leave at employers with 50 or more employees within a 75-mile radius. In Washington it usually runs concurrently with PFML.
PFML pays the wages; FMLA holds the job. An eligible employee typically files a PFML claim and takes FMLA at the same time, not one after the other.
FMLA is the federal floor for unpaid, job-protected leave. The 50-employee threshold counts your entire US workforce, and eligibility needs 12 months of tenure and 1,250 hours worked. Washington PFML uses its own hours test, so a worker can draw PFML wages before they are FMLA-eligible. Run both programmes concurrently; do not add the weeks end to end.
Source: US Department of Labor, Family and Medical Leave Act
Where both apply, the correct sequence is concurrent: the PFML claim funds the wages while FMLA (and Washington's own job-protection rules) preserves the role. FMLA adds up to 26 weeks of military caregiver leave on top. The Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA), enforced by the EEOC, requires reasonable accommodation at any employer with 15 or more employees, separate from any leave entitlement. Washington's own termination and job-protection rules add a further layer you need to map before reinstating from leave.
How Teamed runs Washington leave end to end
Teamed becomes your legal employer of record in Washington for $599 per employee per month flat, with zero FX mark-up. We run PFML premium collection and the 28.57% / 71.43% split, paid sick leave accrual, WA Cares withholding and FMLA tracking.
Real HR and legal experts handle your Washington hires on one platform. An actual person, not a chatbot or a pooled queue, alongside a US employment-law team with deep local expertise.
What that looks like, day to day: a PFML claim concierge files the employer verification with the Employment Security Department and tracks the 16-week clock; the sick-leave ledger accrues 1 hour per 40 worked and applies the Seattle, SeaTac or Tacoma overlay automatically by work location; and the 0.58% WA Cares premium is withheld and remitted on the same run. Compare the same concierge model applied to California's SDI and CFRA to see how Teamed handles multi-programme state leave stacks across the country.
There is no setup fee and no exit fee, and statutory employer cost passes through at cost, itemised on every invoice with no mark-up. Use the employer cost calculator to see the Washington PFML premium, WA Cares line, and sick-leave accrual all at once before you hire. Contractor onboarding, EOR payroll and entity graduation all live on one platform: a Washington contractor who converts to W-2 keeps their record, and that same employee can graduate to your own US entity without switching systems. Use the Crossover Calculator to see the month the model flips. EOR is the right model for a first Washington hire, until it isn't.
Washington is the opposite of a no-programme state. PFML, paid sick leave and WA Cares all apply from your first Seattle hire, with no 50-employee threshold to hide behind. The compliance work is not deciding whether to offer leave, it is administering three stacked programmes correctly and running PFML concurrently with FMLA so you do not double-count the weeks. Get the concurrency wrong and you give away leave the statute never required.
Washington does not leave paid leave to the offer letter. The state runs it.
A 1.13% payroll premium funds up to 16 weeks of family and medical leave, and sick time accrues from the first hour worked.
Your job is to administer it cleanly. An FMLA-only handbook is short from the first paycheque.
