It’s that time of year when the laws passed in the 2014 CA Legislature are taking effect in 2015. Here is a summary of the new laws effecting CA employers and what you need to do to be compliant with these new legal changes. For the full listing of all of the new laws effecting CA Employers in 2015, please go to www.leginfo.ca.gov/ for more detailed information.
AB 1522 – The new law is effective as of July 1, 2015, and it requires most California employers to provide paid sick leave to all of their employees, including part-timers if they work 30 days or more in California. All employers, of any size, are covered including public sector workers.
The employee will now earn an hour of sick pay for each 30 hours worked and they have the right to use paid sick leave after 90 days of employment. The employer can limit paid sick leave to 3 days or 24 hours per 12 month period. Although it is worded in the law as “accrued”, there are no payout-at-termination requirements.
The employer must include the accrued balance of sick pay on the wage statement per Labor Code section 226, or provide a separate document at each pay day. There is also a new poster required with a $100.00 penalty for violating the posting requirement.
Employers: Before July 2015, revise your sick leave policies, payroll checks, and get your new poster posted.
Labor Code Section 512 – The California Supreme court rejected the former “ensure standard”, where an employer had to ensure employees took breaks, whether the employee wanted them or not, and now has defined the employers obligation regarding meal breaks under the “make available” standard, where the employer must make meal breaks available. Under this new standard, if the employer provides a break opportunity to the worker, the employer incurs no liability if the employee then decides to skip or delay the break. Employers must still be sure to relieve the employee of all job duties during their meal break.
Employers need to: 1) Make sure your meal period policies are lawful and still require employees to take meal periods. Don’t make them “optional” because of the new legal standard; and, 2) Update your policy and make sure employees and managers understand the new standard.
AB 1443 – This new bill amends the Fair Employment and Housing Act adding that companies must prohibit harassment against unpaid interns and volunteers as well as employees. Employers: Update Handbooks to include unpaid interns and volunteers on anti-harassment laws.
AB 2053 – This new law expands California’s anti-harassment training law, AB 1825. Now eligible employers must include (as part of AB 1825 training) information about “abusive conduct” (bullying) in addition to the other training requirements about discrimination and retaliation.
Abusive conduct means “conduct of an employer or employee in the workplace, with malice, that a reasonable person would find hostile, offensive, and unrelated to an employer’s legitimate business interests”. This conduct includes repeated infliction of verbal abuse, physical conduct that a reasonable person would find threatening, intimidating, or humiliating, or “the gratuitous sabotage or undermining of a person’s work performance.”
Employers need to update their Harassment Avoidance Training to include this new requirement.
AB 1897 – This new law states that employers who use temp agencies (“labor contractors”) are now liable for the unpaid wages and for failure of the contractor to provide workers’ compensation insurance to their employees. The purpose of the law is to hold companies accountable for wage-and-hour violations when they use staffing agencies or other labor contractors to supply workers. There are exceptions for certain types of labor. This law applies only to employers of more than 25 workers, who hire more than 5 temps from agencies at a time.
Employers: Before you sign to renew your temp contracts, check for wording regarding workers comp coverage and adherence to all Wage & Hour laws. Be sure these items are provided through your temp agency to the workers they place at your company.
SB 1034 – The change in law prohibits health plan insurers from imposing additional waiting periods and repeals a 2011 state law that set a 60-day limit on coverage waiting periods for group health plans. California employers/plan sponsors will defer to the Federal ACA rules when imposing a waiting period which cannot extend past 90 days from the hire, per the eligibility of the plan. This law applies to both small and large group employer plans regardless of grandfathered status. The law also requires employers to notify employees who decline coverage that they would have to wait until the next open enrollment period to sign up for company sponsored health insurance.
Employers: Update your policy stating waiting periods will not extend past 90 days.
The Bay Area Commuter Benefits Program – This new program requires employers with over 50 full-time employees in 9 designated Bay area counties to offer commuter benefits to covered employees. Eligible employers must provide commuter benefits to employees who perform an average of at least 20 hours of work per week, excluding seasonal or temporary employees.
Since September 30, 2014, covered employers must offer at least one of the following commuter benefit options to covered employees:
- Pre-tax option: A program, consistent with section 132(f) of the Internal Revenue Code, allowing covered employees to elect to exclude from taxable wages costs incurred for transit (bus, rail or ferry) passes or vanpool (a vehicle with a carrying capacity of at least six adults, not including the driver) charges, up to $130 per month;
- Employer-paid benefit: A program whereby the employer pays employees a subsidy of up to $75 to cover the cost of commuting via transit or by vanpool; or
- Employer-provided transit: transportation provided by the employer to covered employees at no cost or low-cost via bus, shuttle, or vanpool.
Or, an employer may offer an alternative benefit that provides at least the same reduction in single-occupancy vehicle trips as the three options identified above.
Covered employers are required to: Designate a Commuter Benefits Coordinator who is responsible for implementing the employer’s commuter benefit program and for complying with the Rule; Register online with the Bay Area Air Quality Management District and provide specified information annually thereafter; Provide notice of the Rule and the employer’s commuter benefits to covered employees; and maintaining 3 years of records establishing compliance with the Rule.
Peter Marathas is a partner in the Employee Benefits, Executive Compensation & ERISA Litigation Practice Center and heads both the Employee Benefits Practice in the Boston office and Marathas, Barrow and Weatherhead LLP's Health Care Reform Task Force. Peter is also a die-hard Red Sox fan from Boston.