Bereavement Leave Policy: Sample + Best Practices

Bereavement leave is paid time off an employee can take after the death of a family member. There is no federal law requiring it, so the standard is whatever you write down: most US employers land on 3 to 5 paid days for an immediate family member and 1 to 2 days for extended family. Below is a ready-to-use sample policy, the durations other companies actually use, and the decisions you need to make before you publish it.

Typical durations at a glance

The right number depends on the closeness of the relationship and, increasingly, on travel. Here is what most small and mid-sized employers offer:

A few practical patterns worth copying:

• Add travel days. If the funeral is more than 150 miles away, many policies grant 1 to 2 extra days. This is the single most appreciated detail, because a 3-day allowance disappears fast when someone has to fly across the country.
• Separate the loss from the relationship. A grandparent's death and a spouse's death are not the same event. Tiering your durations keeps the policy fair without forcing managers to negotiate.
• Allow PTO on top. State plainly that employees may add accrued PTO if they need more time. Grief does not run on a fixed schedule.

Who is covered

The hardest part of a bereavement policy is not the number of days. It is defining family, because modern families do not fit a tidy 1950s template. A clear, written list keeps a grieving employee from having to justify their relationship and keeps managers from making awkward judgment calls.

Immediate family

This group gets the full allowance. A defensible immediate-family definition includes:

• Spouse or domestic partner
• Child, stepchild, foster child, or child of a domestic partner
• Parent, stepparent, or legal guardian
• Sibling or stepsibling
• Grandparent and grandchild
• Mother-in-law, father-in-law, son-in-law, daughter-in-law, brother-in-law, sister-in-law

Extended family

This group typically gets 1 to 2 days:

• Aunt, uncle, niece, nephew, cousin
• Spouse's grandparents
• Other relatives by marriage

Chosen family and others

Two situations come up often enough to address directly. First, chosen family: many employees are closest to someone with no legal or blood tie, such as a lifelong best friend or a person who raised them. Decide whether managers can extend the policy at their discretion, and say so. Second, pets: a small but growing number of employers offer 1 day for the loss of a pet. You do not have to, but if you do not, expect the occasional request anyway, so it helps to have an answer ready.

Is bereavement leave required by law?

For most private employers, no. There is no federal mandate. However, a handful of states have passed their own requirements, and the list is growing:

• Oregon requires up to 2 weeks per death under the state family leave law, with limits per year.
• California requires up to 5 days of bereavement leave for employers with five or more employees.
• Illinois requires up to 2 weeks and explicitly covers pregnancy loss, failed adoption, and unsuccessful fertility procedures.
• Maryland and Washington allow accrued paid sick leave to be used for bereavement.

If you operate in multiple states, write your policy to meet the most generous applicable requirement, or maintain state-specific addenda. When you are unsure, treat the state minimum as a floor, not a ceiling.

Copy-paste sample policy

Here is a complete policy you can adapt. Replace the bracketed bits with your own details, and delete anything that does not apply.

Bereavement Leave Policy

Purpose. Company Name provides paid bereavement leave so that employees can grieve, attend services, and handle arrangements after the death of a family member without using personal time off or losing pay.

Eligibility. All regular full-time and part-time employees are eligible from their first day of employment. Part-time employees receive leave prorated to their normal schedule.

Amount of leave.

1. Up to 5 paid days for the death of a spouse, domestic partner, or child.
2. Up to 3 paid days for the death of a parent, sibling, grandparent, grandchild, or the equivalent in-law.
3. Up to 2 paid days for the death of an extended family member, including an aunt, uncle, niece, nephew, or cousin.
4. Up to 5 paid days for a pregnancy loss, stillbirth, failed adoption, or unsuccessful surrogacy or fertility procedure experienced by the employee or their partner.
5. 1 additional day of paid travel time when the service or arrangements require travel of more than 150 miles each way.

Scheduling. Bereavement days do not need to be taken consecutively and may be used within 60 days of the death to accommodate delayed services, scattering of ashes, or memorials.

Requesting leave. Notify your manager as soon as practical, by phone, email, or message. We do not require advance notice. We will not ask for proof, though we may request a simple confirmation such as an obituary or service notice if an extended absence is involved.

Additional time. If you need more time than this policy provides, you may use accrued paid time off, and unpaid leave may be granted at the company's discretion. No one will be penalized for needing more time to grieve.

Pay. Bereavement leave is paid at your regular base rate for the hours you were scheduled to work. It does not count against your PTO balance.

That is the whole policy. It fits on one page, it answers the questions people actually have, and it does not force a grieving employee to argue about whether their loss qualifies.

Best practices that separate a good policy from a token one

Writing the policy is the easy part. These habits are what make it work in practice.

Do not require documentation up front

Asking a grieving employee to produce a death certificate before they can take leave is the fastest way to turn a kind benefit into a resented one. Most employers operate on trust and reserve the right to ask for simple confirmation only for unusually long absences. Abuse of bereavement leave is rare, and the goodwill of trusting people is worth far more than catching the occasional outlier.

Be flexible about timing

Services are increasingly delayed for weeks. Estates take months to settle. A rigid "use it within 3 days of the death" rule fails the people it is meant to help. Allowing the days to be used within 30 to 60 days, and split up if needed, costs you nothing and matters enormously.

Train managers on the human part

A policy is only as good as the manager applying it. Make sure every manager knows the answer to "what do I say when someone tells me a parent died" is "I am so sorry, take whatever time you need, I will handle coverage." The worst outcomes come from a flustered manager improvising a number on the spot.

Plan for coverage, not just absence

When someone is out grieving, the last thing they should field is a flood of "where is the X file" messages. A shared calendar showing who is out and a lightweight coverage plan protect the grieving employee and keep work moving. You can map exactly which working days are affected with our working days calculator, and if you offer additional paid time, our PTO cost calculator shows what a few extra days actually costs, which is almost always less than owners expect.

Keep it consistent with your other leave

Bereavement should sit alongside your PTO, sick, and parental leave policies without contradictions. If you are building or refreshing your whole leave handbook, the PTO policy generator walks you through the standard sections so your bereavement language matches everything else.

A worked example

Say Maria, a full-time employee, loses her father. Under the sample policy she gets 3 paid days. The funeral is in another state, so she also gets 1 paid travel day, for 4 paid days total. She needs a fifth day to help settle the estate, so she adds 1 day of accrued PTO. Her manager confirms coverage on the team calendar, does not ask for any paperwork, and tells her to check in when she is ready.

Total cost to the company: 4 days of pay for someone who was going to be paid anyway across the year, plus 1 day drawn from Maria's own balance. Total benefit: an employee who knows her company showed up for her at the worst moment, and who will remember it.

Putting it into practice

A bereavement policy is short, cheap, and disproportionately powerful for retention and morale. Decide your tiers, define family clearly, do not demand paperwork, and give people room on timing. Then write it down so no one has to negotiate during a funeral.

SimplyPTO makes the tracking side painless: log bereavement days separately from PTO, keep a clear team calendar so coverage is handled, and give managers a simple approve-and-move-on flow instead of a spreadsheet. Start a free SimplyPTO account and have your leave policies running in an afternoon.