When you think about your employment risks (assuming you think about them at all), what do include in that process? Are you expecting employees to walk up to you and say something directly to your face? Or have you and your supervisors been trained to pay attention to the more subtle clues that the company has been put “on notice” for something?

Let’s look at a situation: You’re a supervisor working in your office when you realize you can overhear three  female employees talking in the hallway outside your office. One  says, “Can you believe Tom mentioned sex during yesterday’s sales meeting?” The second says, “Oh, he always talks like that.” The third responds, “Yeah, he always seems to have sex on the mind.” Should you, or are you required to, do anything? Do you consider this “water cooler talk” and ignore it since they didn’t know you could hear? Or do you take action and, if so, what type of action?

Let’s take our situation a step further. Three months later, during your annual sales meeting, a female employee files a complaint alleging that Tom raped her at the hotel. This complaint obviously requires an investigation so I’m not going whether or not you’ll have  [click to read more ...]

This year is the first that I can remember where there were more Federal changes to employment laws than California changes. That alone is historic! But the changes to COBRA  almost seem like they should have been California’s idea because they are so favorable to the employee … or, in this case, the ex-employee.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) was passed on 2/17/09 as part of Obama’s stimulus package. Employers subject to COBRA will now be providing a subsidy to offset the cost of COBRA coverage for employees who were (or are) involuntarily terminated (fired or laid off, unless terminated for gross misconduct) between 9/1/08 and 12/31/09. Yes, it’s retroactive!

You only have until 4/18/09 to get notices out to the affected employees and must send a notice even if they did NOT elect to take COBRA when it was previously offered to them. New employees and newly terminated employees are to receive special notices of these COBRA changes. These model notices can be found in HR Jungle’s free HR forms.

The subsidies are for up to 9 months for COBRA-eligible employees involuntarily terminated and also for affected spouses and dependents who  [click to read more ...]

As you’ve probably noticed, California is always leading the way for new employment laws. However, within California, that leader is San Francisco and it’s often scary to realize what local laws San Francisco has enacted. Let’s just say that, while it’s tough doing business in California, it’s tough and expensive in San Francisco.

The latest bill to hit California proposed by a San Francisco Assemblyman concerns sick leave. This bill, AB 2716, has already made it past the Senate Labor and Industrial Relations Committee and is lined up for the Appropriations Committee. So what’s so bad about AB 2716? It forces every business in California to provide a specific minimum amount of paid sick leave to every employee.

Here’s the actual language:

This bill would provide that an employee who works in California for 7 or more days in a calendar year is entitled to paid sick days, which shall be accrued at a rate of no less than one hour for every 30 hours worked. An employee would be entitled to use accrued sick days beginning on the 90th calendar day of employment. The bill would require employers to provide paid sick days, upon the request of the employee, for diagnosis, care, or treatment of  [click to read more ...]

As a California employer you may have thought at some time or another that the state politicians are just out to get you. Making things difficult for employers isn’t just a complaint, it’s a fact.

However, once in a while you hear things that are behind the new legislation. The law that goes into effect on July 1st requires the use of hands-free devices if cell phones are being used while driving. This isn’t an employment law but employers need to pay special attention. Why? Because you have deeper pockets than the average individual out there driving.

I didn’t say it was fair but it is your responsibility to keep others safe while your employees are on the road. We’ve all been talking on the phone while driving and missed an exit or made some other driving mistake that wouldn’t have occurred if our full attention was on the road. Talking while driving is a distraction … whether you’re talking with a passenger or on the phone.

Those distractions can be costly, both in human life and the bank balance. A few examples (from Powell Goldstein LLP) include:

An insurance company’s employee dropped his cell phone while driving. As he bent  [click to read more ...]

California is hitting companies hard when rest and meal breaks are not honored … or properly documented. Protect your company by handling breaks correctly.

Meal breaks must be at least 30 minutes and provided if your employee is scheduled to work more than five hours. However, if your employee is working no more than six hours the meal break can be skipped. Be sure that employee clocks out within the six-hour window though!

You absolutely want to record those meal breaks. If you use a time clock, have it well documented that employees must clock out for meal breaks and clock back in upon returning to work. If you use handwritten timecards, have the employee write in their meal breaks and initial each day (or weekly at a minimum).

Rest breaks are harder to document because employees don’t clock out for them. So, again, make sure you put in writing your rules for 10 minute rest breaks every four hours. And don’t ignore them yourself by not calculating work schedules to allow for them.

If you don’t think this is serious, ask Rady Children’s Hospital. They’ve had to pay nearly $2.8 million to compensate about 2,000 current and previous employees who  [click to read more ...]