A downloadable leave tracker checks one number against 1,250 and stops there. The DOL's own FMLA hours-worked guidance states that the count follows FLSA principles, which exclude time on paid or unpaid leave entirely. Yet most templates run the test straight off a payroll export's hours-paid total, which still includes vacation and sick pay. A tracker built that way can clear 1,250 hours on paper while the employee is actually short of it, and nothing on the sheet says so.
Marloe Logistics, the fictional 240-person warehouse software company used across this cluster, received a leave request from Rosa Delgado on 10 August 2026. Her payroll export reports 1,377 hours paid in the trailing 12 months, comfortably over the threshold. Recomputing from her 27-hour weekly schedule, minus 3 weeks of vacation, 2 of sick leave and 1 unpaid personal week, leaves 1,242 hours actually worked, 8 hours short. The eligibility notice due five business days later states that reason by number, not a bare denial.
Devon Ling's case shows the other trap. His 480-hour FMLA bank, 12 weeks at a 40-hour schedule, hit zero on 29 June 2026 while a doctor's note still required a reduced schedule. Marloe's old policy read an exhausted bank as grounds to end his employment automatically. The ADA carries no hours or tenure threshold of its own, so the file opens an interactive-process entry the same day instead, documented with the same specificity a handbook's change summary already runs on. A 3-week modified-duty accommodation followed, reviewed on a stated date rather than left open-ended.
Leave of Absence Tracking Template