Colorado Paid Sick Leave Law: Accrual, Uses, and Retaliation

Colorado’s paid sick leave law, the Healthy Families and Workplaces Act (HFWA), gives nearly every worker in the state one hour of paid sick leave for every 30 hours worked, up to 48 hours a year. Leave is available from the first day of employment, covers a wide range of health, family, safety, and emergency reasons, and applies to employers of every size.

Who the Law Covers

Every employer operating in Colorado is covered: private businesses, nonprofits, and public agencies, with no size threshold. On the worker side, full-time, part-time, seasonal, and temporary employees all qualify.¹

Two narrow groups are not covered: federal government employees and certain railroad workers covered by the federal Railroad Unemployment Insurance Act. State and local government employees are in. Independent contractors are not employees under Colorado wage law and are not covered, though misclassifying an employee as a contractor does not erase the obligation.¹

How Much Leave You Earn

Accrual is one hour for every 30 hours worked, starting on day one. The annual cap is 48 hours, and employers can be more generous if they want.² Exempt salaried employees accrue based on a 40-hour week unless their normal schedule is shorter.

Instead of tracking accrual hour by hour, an employer can front-load the full 48 hours at the start of the benefit year. Either method satisfies the law as long as the amount available meets or exceeds what the employee would otherwise have earned.³

There is no waiting period. Hours become usable as soon as they accrue.

What You Can Use Sick Leave For

The list of qualifying reasons is broader than most workers expect:

Your own physical or mental illness, injury, or health condition, including diagnosis, treatment, and preventive care.
Caring for a family member who is ill, injured, or needs medical treatment or preventive care.
Bereavement, including funeral arrangements and handling financial or legal matters after a family member’s death.
Dealing with domestic abuse, sexual assault, or harassment affecting you or a family member — medical care, counseling, victim services, legal help, or relocation.
Caring for a child or family member whose school or care facility closes because of a public health emergency, severe weather, power outage, or similar event.
Leaving your own home because of severe weather, a utility failure, or another unexpected emergency.

That last one is easy to miss. If a wildfire evacuation order pushes you out of your home, accrued sick leave covers the time you miss from work.⁴

Who Counts as a Family Member

The HFWA uses a wider definition of family than many leave laws. It includes a spouse, parent, child, or sibling, and it also includes any person for whom you are responsible for providing or arranging health- or safety-related care.⁵ That can reach an elderly neighbor or close friend you look after. You decide who fits based on your actual caregiving responsibilities.

Notice and Documentation

For a foreseeable absence, like a scheduled medical appointment, your employer can require advance notice “as soon as practicable” and can set reasonable written procedures for giving that notice. The employer cannot deny leave solely because you did not follow the procedure perfectly.¹ For an unforeseeable absence, there is no advance notice requirement.

Documentation is a separate question, and the rules are tight. An employer can only ask for documentation when an absence lasts four or more consecutive scheduled workdays — not four calendar days — and cannot ask for it before you take the leave. If you did not see a provider, or you cannot get a note without added cost or delay, a written statement from you explaining the reason is enough. For safety-related leave, a document like a restraining order or police report also works.

Employers cannot require signatures, notarization, or any particular format, and must accept electronic submissions. Any information you share has to be kept confidential and separate from your other personnel records. If the employer thinks what you turned in is deficient, it has to tell you within seven days and give you at least seven more days to fix it.⁶

Carryover, Quitting, and Rehire

Up to 48 hours of unused sick leave carries into the next year. Even with a larger banked balance from carryover, the employer does not have to let you use more than 48 hours in any single year.⁷

Unused sick leave is not paid out when you quit, retire, or are terminated. The one exception: if a retaliatory action kept you from using leave you had already earned, the leave itself can be recovered as a remedy.³ If the same employer rehires you within six months, your previously accrued sick leave has to be reinstated.

Extra Leave During a Public Health Emergency

When a public health emergency is formally declared, the HFWA adds a separate block of paid leave on top of what you have accrued. It was used heavily during COVID-19 and remains available for any future declared emergency.

The amount depends on your normal schedule. If you normally work 40 or more hours a week, you get at least 80 hours. If you work fewer hours, you get the greater of either your scheduled hours in a 14-day period or your average hours actually worked in a 14-day period. The supplemental leave is available immediately when the emergency is declared and can be used until four weeks after it officially ends.⁸

Qualifying uses include isolating because of symptoms or a diagnosis tied to the emergency, seeking related medical care, caring for an affected family member, and caring for a child whose school or childcare closed because of the emergency. Employers cannot require documentation for public health emergency leave.⁶

How This Fits With Federal FMLA

The federal Family and Medical Leave Act provides up to 12 weeks of job-protected but unpaid leave per year, and it only applies to employers with 50 or more employees within 75 miles, and only to employees who have worked for the employer at least 12 months and logged at least 1,250 hours in the prior year.⁹ The HFWA covers every Colorado employer and every covered employee from day one.

When both laws apply to the same absence, the leave can run concurrently. An employer can require you to use HFWA-accrued paid sick leave during an FMLA absence, which means the time off is both FMLA-protected and paid.¹⁰ At a smaller employer where FMLA does not apply, you still get paid HFWA leave, but you do not get FMLA’s longer job-protection window.

Retaliation Protections

The HFWA bars employers from retaliating against workers who use or try to use sick leave, file a complaint, cooperate with an investigation, or tell a coworker about their rights. Counting a lawful HFWA absence as a negative mark in an attendance-based discipline system is itself a violation.¹¹

Protection extends to anyone acting in good faith, even if an underlying complaint turns out to be mistaken. If an investigation finds that retaliation cost you your job or pay, the Division of Labor Standards and Statistics can order reinstatement, lost wages, or both. Each affected employee counts as a separate violation.¹¹

Filing a Complaint

The Division of Labor Standards and Statistics inside the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment investigates sick leave complaints. The Division is required to investigate every claim of denied sick leave. Retaliation claims may also be investigated at the Division’s discretion.¹¹

You file a complaint by submitting a Labor Standards Complaint Form through the CDLE. HFWA leave counts as wages under Colorado law, so denied sick leave moves through the same channel as any other unpaid wage claim.¹² One important limit: the Division only handles wage claims of $7,500 or less. You can still file with the Division for part of a bigger claim up to that amount, but anything above $7,500 has to go to court.¹³

Before you file, you can send your employer a written demand for the unpaid wages. If the employer does not pay within 14 days, you may be able to recover additional penalties on top of the original amount, either through the Division or in court.¹² The written demand is not required, but it can strengthen a claim and sometimes resolves the issue without a formal case.

1
Colorado Department of Labor and Employment. Interpretive Notice and Formal Opinion 6B – Paid Sick Leave under the Healthy Families and Workplaces Act
2
Colorado Department of Labor and Employment. Colorado Revised Statutes 8-13.3-403 – Paid Sick Leave Accrual
3
FindLaw. Colorado Code 8-13.3-403 – Paid Sick Leave Accrual Carry Forward
4
Colorado Department of Labor and Employment. Colorado Revised Statutes 8-13.3-404 – Use of Paid Sick Leave
5
Colorado Department of Labor and Employment. Colorado Revised Statutes 8-13.3-402 – Definitions
6
Colorado Department of Labor and Employment. Interpretive Notice and Formal Opinion 6B – Paid Sick Leave under the Healthy Families and Workplaces Act
7
Legal Information Institute. 7 CCR 1103-7-3 – Filing a Wage Complaint – Section: Yearly Basis for HFWA Leave
8
Justia. Colorado Code 8-13.3-405 – Additional Paid Sick Leave During a Public Health Emergency
9
U.S. Department of Labor. Family and Medical Leave Act
10
U.S. Department of Labor. Fact Sheet 28 – The Family and Medical Leave Act
11
Justia. Colorado Code 8-13.3-407 – Employee Rights Protected Retaliation Prohibited
12
Colorado Department of Labor and Employment. Worker Complaints and Employer Responses
13
Department of Labor and Employment. Division Authority and Coverage – Section: Unpaid Wages