NY Disability and PFL: Benefits, Filing, and Job Protection

New York requires almost every private employer to carry two wage-replacement policies for their workers: Disability Benefits (commonly called DBL) and Paid Family Leave (PFL). NY disability and paid family leave cover different situations. DBL pays you when your own off-the-job illness or injury keeps you from working, up to $170 per week. PFL pays you when you need time off to bond with a new child, care for a seriously ill family member, or handle certain military-family needs, up to $1,228.53 per week in 2026.¹² Both sit inside the Workers’ Compensation Law, both are funded largely through employee payroll deductions, and both use their own forms, deadlines, and rules.

Who Qualifies

Eligibility depends on your hours and how long you’ve been with your employer.

For DBL, if you work 20 or more hours per week, you’re covered after four consecutive weeks on the job. If you work fewer than 20 hours, you qualify on your 25th day of employment.³ Coverage reaches most private-sector employees, including domestic workers in certain situations. Public-sector employers can opt in but aren’t required to.

For PFL, employees who regularly work 20 or more hours per week qualify after 26 consecutive weeks with a covered employer. Those working fewer than 20 hours qualify after 175 days worked.⁴ Domestic workers need at least 40 hours per week for one employer to be covered.

If you know from the start your schedule will never hit these thresholds, your employer should offer a PFL waiver. Signing it means no payroll deductions but no benefits. If your schedule later changes and you do meet eligibility, the waiver automatically revokes and your employer can retroactively collect deductions going back to the date you signed.⁴

What Each Program Covers

Disability Benefits

DBL replaces part of your wages when a medical condition unrelated to your job keeps you from working. That includes surgery recovery, a flare-up of a chronic condition, an injury sustained outside work, or a pregnancy-related disability. The condition has to be your own, not a family member’s, and it can’t have happened on the job. Work injuries go through workers’ compensation instead.¹

Paid Family Leave

PFL covers three categories of family-related events:

Bonding with a newborn, newly adopted child, or newly placed foster child within the first 12 months.
Caring for a family member with a serious health condition.
Handling certain needs tied to a family member’s active-duty military deployment.

The list of qualifying family members is broader than many people expect. It includes your spouse, domestic partner (no legal registration required), child or stepchild, parent or stepparent, parent-in-law, grandparent, grandchild, and sibling.⁵

How Much You’ll Receive and for How Long

Disability Benefits

DBL pays 50% of your average weekly wage, with a hard ceiling of $170 per week.⁶ That cap hasn’t moved in decades, so for most workers the practical benefit is simply $170 a week. Payments last up to 26 weeks within any 52-consecutive-week period. There is a seven-day waiting period before payments begin: you get nothing for the first seven days of disability, and payments start on the eighth consecutive day.³

Paid Family Leave

PFL is far more generous. In 2026, it pays 67% of your average weekly wage, capped at 67% of the statewide average weekly wage ($1,833.63). The maximum weekly benefit works out to $1,228.53.² You can take up to 12 weeks of PFL in any 52-week period, with no waiting period.⁷

PFL can be taken all at once or broken into individual days. The maximum number of intermittent days depends on how many days per week you normally work. Someone working five days a week gets up to 60 days (5 × 12 weeks); someone working three gets up to 36. If more than three months pass between intermittent PFL days, your next day of leave counts as a new claim and you’ll need to submit a new application.⁵

What You Pay For It

PFL is entirely employee-funded through payroll deductions. In 2026, you contribute 0.432% of your gross wages per pay period, up to a maximum of $411.91 for the year.² Your employer collects the deductions and sends them to the insurance carrier.⁸

DBL contributions are shared. Employees may be required to contribute toward the cost, and the maximum employee share through the New York State Insurance Fund drops to $17.68 per person for the year in 2026.⁹ The employer covers any remaining premium.

How to File a Claim

Disability Benefits

The main form is DB-450, the Notice and Proof of Claim for Disability Benefits. You fill out the employee section describing your condition and when it began. Your doctor completes a separate section certifying the nature of the disability and how long you’re expected to be out. Submit the completed form directly to your employer’s insurance carrier, not to the Workers’ Compensation Board.¹

File your DBL claim within 30 days of becoming disabled. Missing that window can reduce your payments, and waiting longer than 26 weeks risks forfeiting benefits entirely.¹ Once the carrier has a complete application, it has 18 days to issue a decision. If approved, payments come every two weeks.

Paid Family Leave

PFL uses the PFL-1 series of forms, with different versions depending on your reason for leave. The first section covers your personal and employer information. Additional sections have to be completed by other parties: a healthcare provider for caregiving claims, military authorities for deployment-related leave, or documentation of a birth, adoption, or foster placement for bonding claims.¹⁰

Caregiving claims specifically require the family member’s healthcare provider to certify the serious health condition and include their National Provider Identifier (NPI). Bonding claims typically need a birth certificate or court documents for adoption or foster placement. Fill all forms in blue or black ink for scanning, and double-check Social Security numbers before submitting. Incomplete forms are one of the most common reasons for delays. The carrier has 18 days after receiving a complete request to approve or deny.

If either program denies your claim, the carrier must send a written explanation and instructions for requesting a hearing through the Workers’ Compensation Board.

Using Both Benefits Around the Same Event

DBL and PFL can’t overlap. You cannot collect both at the same time, and the two combined cannot exceed 26 weeks within a 52-week period measured on a rolling basis.¹¹ This matters most for new parents who give birth, who may qualify for both: DBL for medical recovery from childbirth and PFL for bonding.

You have options. You can take some or all of your available DBL first for medical recovery and then switch to PFL for bonding anytime in the child’s first 12 months. Or you can skip DBL entirely and go straight to PFL, which pays significantly more per week.¹¹ Given the gap between $170 a week under DBL and up to $1,228.53 a week under PFL, many birth parents choose to minimize DBL time when they can.

If your leave also qualifies under the federal Family and Medical Leave Act, your employer may require the FMLA leave to run concurrently with your PFL, and must notify you when both designations apply. FMLA provides job protection but no pay; PFL provides both, so running them together doesn’t reduce your PFL benefits.

Job Protection When You Return

PFL comes with full job protection. Your employer must reinstate you to the same position or a comparable one when you come back. An employer cannot fire you, cut your pay, reduce your benefits, or discipline you for requesting or taking PFL.⁴

If your employer doesn’t restore your position, you can file a formal reinstatement request using Form PFL-DC-119 and send a copy to the Paid Family Leave office. The employer has 30 calendar days to respond. If it doesn’t comply, you can request a hearing before the Workers’ Compensation Board, where an administrative law judge can order reinstatement, back pay, attorney’s fees, and up to $500 in penalties.⁴

DBL does not carry the same explicit statutory reinstatement right as PFL. Other laws, including FMLA for employers with 50 or more employees, may separately protect your position during a medical leave.

Taxes on the Benefits You Receive

PFL benefits count as taxable income on your federal return. You’ll receive a Form 1099-G or Form 1099-MISC from your employer or carrier showing the total paid during the year.¹² PFL benefits are not subject to Social Security or Medicare tax withholding, and no federal income tax is automatically withheld, so plan on setting money aside for tax time.

DBL benefits are generally not taxable when the premiums were funded by after-tax employee contributions. Since most New York employees pay their DBL share through after-tax payroll deductions, most recipients don’t owe federal income tax on those payments. If your employer paid the full premium on your behalf, the benefits may be taxable. Check with your carrier or a tax professional if you’re unsure how your employer’s plan is set up.

If Your Employer Doesn’t Carry Coverage

Every covered employer is required to carry both policies, and going without coverage exposes them to Workers’ Compensation Board penalties, fines, and potential misdemeanor liability.¹³ For you as an employee, the important part is what happens to your claim. If you suspect your employer doesn’t carry the required coverage, you can report it to the Workers’ Compensation Board. Employees who are denied benefits because their employer lacked coverage may still receive payments through the Board’s Special Fund, though the process takes longer than a standard claim.

1
Workers’ Compensation Board. Workers Disability Benefits
2
Paid Family Leave. New York Paid Family Leave Updates for 2026
3
Workers’ Compensation Board. Employee Eligibility and Benefits
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Paid Family Leave. Employer Responsibilities and Resources
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Paid Family Leave. Paid Family Leave for Family Care
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New York State Senate. New York Workers Compensation Law WCL 204 – Disability and Family Leave During Employment
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Paid Family Leave. Employees – New York State Paid Family Leave
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Paid Family Leave. Paid Family Leave Information for Employers
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New York State Insurance Fund. NYSIF Lowers Standard Disability Benefits Premium Rate for 2026
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Paid Family Leave. Paid Family Leave Forms
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Paid Family Leave. Paid Family Leave and Other Benefits
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New York State Department of Taxation and Finance. New York State Paid Family Leave
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New York State Workers’ Compensation Board. Penalties for Not Having Disability and Paid Family Leave Benefits Coverage