How long will it take to be hired for a position?

Pregnant working temp-to-hire position, what to do?

• I've been at my "temporary" job for about 8 months now. I'm about 5 months pregnant but I haven't told my employer yet due to all the "horror stories" I've heard about where women get fired or given a hard time once they tell the employer they're pregnant. My position is through a temp agency and they actually just laid off about 75% of the temps last week, but my agency said that because of my good performance I was being extended. I asked the agency how long the extension was and they say more will be let go in November and February and some will be kept on "indefinitely and probably hired on permanent. I'm pretty sure if I'd told them I'm pregnant they would have laid me off too, but I just so happen to not be showing much (actually I'm just now starting to show a little bit). Now I'm trying to figure out how to go about informing them that I'm pregnant. I was thinking that I would just let the temp agency know and let them know that I would like to stay on the position as long as possible but that I'm having my baby in January and would of course have to take off when I have the baby. I don't know if telling the temp agency is enough or if I need to also tell a supervisor at my job (or if the agency would just communicate that to the job for me). When they laid all those people off last week the company I'm working for told us that it wasn't their job to inform us if we were being laid off it was the job of the agency, which makes me think I should communicate my pregnancy to the agency. I would actually prefer for them to lay me off than to leave myself because at least I could get unemployment but if I take off on my own I'm not protected under FMLA because I would be employed just under a year when I have the baby - in fact January will be 12 months. Any thoughts on this???

• Answer:

  You said you are working through a temp service. They are considered your employer, so you should tell them about your pregnancy. You're going to have to tell them sooner or later, so you should tell them as soon as possible. Be honest with the company. If you got pregnant whiled employed with them, they shouldn't have no problem with it. They will probably tell the company you are working for.