40. Loss of maternity allowance for failure to notify employer.
(1) A female employee who is about to leave her employment and who knows or has reason to believe that she will be confined within four months from the date upon which she leaves shall before leaving her employment notify her employer of her pregnancy and if she fails to do so, she shall not be entitled to receive any maternity allowance from such employer.
(2) A female employee shall within a period of sixty days immediately preceding her expected confinement notify her employer of it and the date from which she intends to commence her maternity leave and if she commences such leave without so notifying her employer, the payment of maternity allowance to her may be suspended, notwithstanding section 38, until such notice is given to her employer.
(3) Any employer who dismisses a female employee from her employment during the period in which she is entitled to maternity leave commits an offence.
(4) Any female employee whose employer provides free medical treatment for his employees and who when she is pregnant persistently refuses or fails to submit to such medical treatment offered free by her employer as a registered medical practitioner certifies to be necessary or desirable in connection with her pregnancy, expected confinement or confinement shall, if she would otherwise be entitled to receive any maternity allowance, forfeit such allowance to the extent of seven days.
(5) The want of or any defect or inaccuracy in any notice required to be given in accordance with this section shall not be a bar to the maintenance of any claim to maternity allowance unless the employer is proved to have been prejudiced by the want, defect or inaccuracy of such notice.
(6) The failure to give any such notice within the period specified in this section shall not prejudice the right of a female employee to receive any maternity allowance if it is found that the failure was occasioned by mistake or other reasonable cause:
Provided that any dispute as to whether such failure was occasioned by mistake or other reasonable cause shall be referred under section 69 to the Director-General for his decision.
(7) Notice to an employer or, if there is more than one employer, to one of such employers, may be given either in writing or orally or to the foreman or other person under whose supervision the female employee was employed or to any person designated for the purpose by the employer.
