Mandatory Paid Sick Leave: If you have 1 or more employees — this applies to you!

Beginning July 1, 2015 a new California law requires employers like you with one or more employees (including part-time and temporaries) to provide paid sick leave. Here are some highlights you should be aware of:

• The sick leave accrual rate is one hour for every 30 hours worked.

• Sick leave pay goes to any employee who worked in California for 30 days.

• Employers are allowed to limit an employee’s use of paid sick leave to 24 hours or three days in each year of employment.

• Employers may put a maximum cap on total accrual of 48 hours or six days. Note: The rules differ for employers who give 3 days sick leave in a lump sum in the beginning of the year.

• Sick leave may be used to care for family illness and that includes parents, children, foster and stepchildren, grandparents, siblings, domestic partners and others.

• Detailed recordkeeping and notice requirements, including a new poster requirement, are mandatory. Noncompliance with this law has penalties

As you can see, this is a complex law. I’d suggest contacting your payroll service for help figuring how to meet the pay stub requirements. For more general questions, you can contact me for a no-cost consultation.

PAID SICK LEAVE Poster Available FREE!

The Healthy Workplaces/Health Families Act of 2014 requires employees to display a Paid Sick Leave poster where employees can easily read it by January 1, 2015. The law may involve additional costs — but the poster is available to you for free. 

Simply click this URL to access the poster http://www.dir.ca.gov/DLSE/Publications/Paid_Sick_Days_Poster_Template_%2811_2014%29.pdf, print it out on an 8 x 11 sheet of paper and post it with your other employment posters before the New Year.

Sickening News for Small Employers?

California's new paid sick leave law goes into effect July 1, 2015.

Once we've all exhausted our complaints about how totally unfriendly California is to small business — what should employers do to inoculate themselves?

First know what the law mandates. Unlike most of California employment laws, this statute applies to companies as small as one employee. All employers (subject to some narrow exceptions) must provide one hour of sick leave for every 30 hours worked by their employees.

Lawyers are still working out the details of how this law will be implemented. My advice – wait until the dust settles before developing your own policy and procedure.

In a few weeks HR professionals and lawyers will be sending out free sample lists of things to do to get ready for the law's start date is July. Keep tuned to www.hrlegalresults.com for further updates.  Or call me with questions and concerns at 650-518-0327.

Anti-workplace bullying statute: A death knell for merit-based pay?

There's a new statute that applies to employers with over 50 employees known as “abusive conduct prevention training.” The law appears to be innocuous enough — it “simply” requires these employers to add anti-bullying training to their already existing sexual harassment prevention training classes.

That appearance is deceptive. On closer examination you'll see that the law isn’t simply addressing the obnoxious behavior of willful bullies. It also covers managers who undermine “a person’s work performance.”

Why do I think this law will lead to the curtailing of merit-based pay? Because the new working generations have been brought up in an environment where they are always winners no matter whether they score any points in the game. For them everyone goes home with a trophy just for showing up.

Traditionally work has been different. Not every employee’s performance makes them an MVP. The rule has been that merit is rewarded. In Silicon Valley companies best performers get the best performance evaluations, the best salary increases and the best stock options. On the other hand poor performers are transitioned out of the company.

Will the traditional merit-based system seem “abusive” to people who have never heard anything but “good job.” A recent article on workplace bullying in Health Magazine advised employees that, “If you have a bully, chances are it’s your boss.”

Should the younger generation’s idea of any comparative performance rating as “abusive” prevail under this statute then managers could only give merit-pay raises at their peril of being subject to discipline or eventually being sued. Although the statute does not include a private cause of action against an abusive manager at this point that seems to be the direction we’re headed for in California.

When you're looking to add this new “Abusive Conduct Prevention” training to your sexual harassment classes keep in mind the precarious situation managers are being put into based on the definition of managerial abusive conduct in today's environment. Make sure your training and your company policy clearly delineates the difference between merit-based pay for performance from willful conduct that undermines and sabotages an individual’s work performance.