Would you like to familiarize yourself with employment information pertaining to leave and other benefits? In 2017, Governor Jerry Brown signed some employment and labor bills that the California legislature passed into law.

Examples of leave and benefit laws in California

Leave and benefits

SB 63

According to the California Family Rights Act (CFRA), any employer with 50 employees and more will be in infringement of the law should they deny leave to a new parent. The law states that parents with newborns whether adopted, fostered or biological are entitled to 12 weeks of paid leave. However, the CFRA law is only eligible in the following cases;

– The employee must have been with the company for a minimum of one year and must have completed at least 1250 hours of work or more during that duration.
– The employee must be within a work site with over 50 employees within a 75-mile radius.

Hours and wages

SB3 – California’s minimum wages

An employer with over 25 employees must increase the wages from $10.50 to $11 per hour. The new law will see the minimum annual salaries grow from $43,680 to $ 45, 760.

Employers with 25 workers or less, will have to increase the minimum wage from $10 to $10.50 per hour increasing the minimum annual salaries from $ 41,600 to $ 43,680.

AB 1701 – Direct contractors must pay off any outstanding wages owned by subcontractors

Should any tier subcontractors fail to pay wages to claimants, the direct contractors, in this case, are liable for any debts owed. The liability will, however, exclude penalties, interest owed and will extend to:

– Fringe benefits
– Contributions
– Unpaid wages

If a contractor owes any benefits to third parties, a private action will see courts waive expert witness and attorney fees.

Immigration

AB 450

An employer shall not disclose an employee’s immigration status without a warrant unless the federal law directs the operation. The same law also pertains to access to employee records.

Employers in breach of the laws face hefty fines of $2000 to $5000 for first offenders and $ 5000 to $10000 for repeat offenders.

Hiring practices

AB 1008 – Criminal history considerations

It’s illegal for an employer to discontinue employment under inconclusive detentions and arrest that did not yield to convictions. Therefore, employers will be breaking the law by;

– Asking questions regarding any conviction histories during the application process.
– Disclose information regarding prior arrests
– Inquire about past criminal histories until the employer makes a considerable offer.

The new laws regarding leave and other benefits will provide better working conditions for every employee in California.

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There are new developments within the California labor laws. The developments are as a result of Gov. Jerry Brown asserting some bills into law. The scopes of the new laws are wide. They range from health and safety laws, wages and hours, leave and benefits, workplace protection, and hiring practices laws. As such, lawyers should be up-to-date with all these laws for easy practice and guidance to their clients. Such laws apply to all California residents.

Some of the said laws were effective from 1st January 2018. Employees and employers will also benefit by knowing the nitty-gritty of these laws for they are not only applicable to the legal minds. That being said, all concerned parties should comply with the laws to avoid rubbing shoulders with the law. Remember, ignorance of the law is not an excuse whatsoever.

For an employee to be eligible for such a leave, they must have:

Small California firms are also expected to provide bonding leaves to their staff. Such firms are the ones that employ 20 to 49 staff members. Employees of these firms qualify for bonding leaves if:

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The Employment Development Department (EDD) is required to listen to all counterclaims if they have information that’s evidence-driven. For whatever reason, your ex-employer may hold a grudge against you or is guilty of wrongdoing that you found-out. They may opt to burden you further by claiming your reason for quitting was due to misconduct.

Some companies will try to avoid paying for unlawful termination lawsuits and even their unemployment insurance to cut corners further. Their strategy may include targeting selected employees for harassment and bullying to drive them to quit. This, unfortunately, can happen to many seasonal and short-term workers.

Three months is the shortest period that you can claim unemployment compensation. These employers will not want to pay for their additional unemployment insurance and find sneaky ways to prevent you from collecting on that insurance benefit. If you quit your job voluntarily, this will not allow you to get benefits from the EDD. Especially if there’s no claim on your behalf, such as documented violence or harassment, that led to you suddenly quitting. Yet if you did quit and were being forced to leave there are steps you can follow to reverse the unemployment claim.

What can you do?

Being denied the ability to claim unemployment makes it difficult to cover basic living expenses. This also can prevent you from using these benefits to look for another job effectively. In the event you feel that your ex-employer is blackballing you, you’ll need to follow these tips:

• Get as many witness statements from those who are willing to tell what happened.

• Gather as much evidence or proof of your claims (mobile phone recordings, pictures, etc.)

• Bring all of these items with you to your EDD hearing

• If you do not win the final verdict, you have the right to appeal your case by a specific time

Unemployment benefit extensions

Luckily in the end, if you do win the appeal and are granted unemployment benefits, there’s added benefit extensions. An additional 20 weeks can be added to your claim if they fall into selected categories.

• If you accept work that pays lower than the amount you were being paid previously

• Accepting work tasks that differ from your skill-set with lower expected pay

• Going to all scheduled EDD re-employment service interviews

Disaster Unemployment Assistance

If your work was affected by a natural disaster, you can claim Disaster Unemployment assistance. The affected area needs to be further listed as such, by FEMA and by the US President. For this claim, you are eligible to collect up to 26 weeks from the date your disaster area was declared.

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Humans are social beings. You will note that most employees normally form labor unions in their companies or organizations to band together. There are several reasons why most employees consider joining these unions. Some of these reasons include: negotiate for better working conditions, better salaries and so on. You will note that these unions are normally concerned about how the employees are treated in the workplace.

It is through these unions that the employer listens to his or her employees. Some employees normally strike as a result of poor pay and working conditions. Other, usually want to have a salary increment. These unions normally discuss with the employer and usually come up with a collective bargaining agreement. There are many questions that are asked about these unions. Some of these questions include:

How do people form a union?

The primary reason for forming these unions is to improve the working conditions and have a good pay. You will note that a single employee might not be heard by his or her employer. However, when people come together and address one problem collectively, they can be heard. In this case,
workers should ask the government to hold an election. If the workers win their union, they will negotiate a contract with the employer. This contract will outline the rights of each party in the workplace.

Does the law protect those workers who are joining unions?

Ideally, the law should protect the employees who want to join unions. However, this is not always the case. There are some instances where the employer discriminates those employees who join a certain union. Some employees actually threaten to fire those employees who join unions. However, this is wrong. Employees should be free to join unions as they wish.

Which workers normally form unions today?

You will note that there are several kinds of employees who join unions today. Nowadays, women and immigrants normally join unions. The following are some of the people who join unions today: doctors, teachers, engineers and so on.

Are these unions beneficial to the working families?

It is true to say that these unions are beneficial to the working families. You will note that employees are able to enjoy better working conditions, better salaries, and even salary increment. This goes a long way in improving the living standards of these families.

Those are some of the common questions that are asked about these unions. If you are an employee, you should consider joining a labor union today. It is truly incredible.

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In the Collected States, the Division of Labor accepts accountability in completing more than 180 laws that are identified with employment. From this time forward, if you are working in California, you ought to be secured by these provisions, which possibly give you rights and benefits and additionally set standards in different parts of labor and employment.

This is the basic inspiration driving why it is a point of fact important for each one of the organizations and specialists to understand some basic standards of the Employment and Labor Laws. By thinking about it, you will be more familiar with the technique on the most ideal approach to handling any encroachment. However, you may regardless depend upon the inclination of Los Angeles Employment and Labor Law lawyers if, still, you believe that its difficult to handle your condition.

Significant Laws Got Ready for Labor and Employment

The going with law provisions more often than not make a difference to directors, delegates, retirees, work searchers and different individuals or get-togethers who have an impact in the employment part. This abstract is wanted to set out some important information concerning labor law consistency and benefits. For a distinct data about these laws, better read the whole provisions or have a meeting with your employment lawyer in Los Angeles.

Working Condition Prosperity

Under the Word related Prosperity and Prosperity Act, organizations have the general responsibility regarding give their masters employments and workplaces, which are free from any identifiable and honest to goodness threats. Any encroachment concerning this game plan may be raised to the Word related Security and Prosperity Association, which is the workplace endowed to realize orders for such non-compliances among general society portion agents.

Laborer’s Compensation

Government specialists may take the upside of benefits portions due to loss of wages caused by their total or deficient powerlessness. This in like manner fuses portions to take care of other related restorative expenses and expert recuperation. The Administration Delegates’ Compensation Exhibit applies to those masters who have gotten handicap or passed on in playing out their commitments.

Among different statutes identified with Authority’s Compensation are:

Longshore and Harbor Laborers’ Compensation Show – ocean specialists

Essentialness Agents Infection Pay Program Act – Branch of Imperativeness specialists

Dim Lung Benefits Act – coal diggers

Wages and Hours

The Sensible Labor Standards Act covers both private and open managers. This specific law sets the standard of paying wages and likewise additional time hours for secured masters. Included bits of knowledge about this statute may be gotten from the Wage and Hour Division of the Employment Standards Association, which coordinates the showing.

Specialist Benefits Security

Another supportive law that controls annuity and welfare benefit plans offered by organizations to their laborers is the Specialist Retirement Pay Security Act or typically known as ERISA Law. This requires different conditions as for laborers’ annuity and welfare benefit outlines and other related issues. The workplace controlling this exhibition is the Agent Benefits Security Association.

Family and Remedial Leave Act

This Labor Law plan impel all organizations with no under 50 pros to offer up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave to qualified delegates without the threat of reassignment to other occupation position. Specialists may take their unpaid leave for these causes:

Considering a posterity

Managing a newborn child or grasped adolescent

Regulating to buddy, youths or watchmen having honest to goodness affliction

These are just a bit of the important Employment and Labor Laws. If you feel that your director has manhandled any of these provisions, exhibition quickly and search for the guide of your Los Angeles Employment and Labor Law lawyers. You may be entitled to compensatory damages or recoveries.

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In the state of California, COBRA i.e. Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act allow workers and their spouses and/ or dependents to continue their group- health insurance coverage even if there is a catastrophe which have occurred and which would otherwise terminate coverage, like the worker getting laid off or his/ her spouse getting divorced. Generally, the benefits that one is supposed to reap from the insurance coverage lasts from one to three years, and it is often determined by the circumstance.

What are the COBRA Basics?

If you’ re an employee and you have been covered by your employer’s group- health insurance plan in California, you are usually allowed to continue with your coverage despite the existence of factors which would otherwise terminate your coverage.

Some of the factors which in most cases are referred as qualifying events that can easily end up terminating your coverage as an employee include; being fired, getting laid off or quitting (for other reasons apart from gross misconduct).

The spouse as well as dependents of the employee can continue their coverage also in case any of the afore- mentioned qualifying events occur. In case the employee dies, he/ she divorce with his or her spouse, he or she qualifies for Medicare, the spouse and dependents become eligible for their coverage.

However, be informed that an employee, his or her dependent or spouse who benefits via COBRA is always required to pay the cost of coverage in full. Be informed also that the cost of coverage is normally less as it would cost to buy an individual insurance policy because in most cases employers often negotiate lower group- health insurance rates.

How Long Does Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act Last?

The qualifying events greatly determine the period of COBRA benefits. Basically, in case the qualifying even happens to be the quitting of the employee, reduction of working hours of an employee or termination of an employee, benefits last for 1 year.

In case the qualifying event is the death of an employee, divorce or the employee or loss of dependent status by the defendant under the plan, COBRA benefits last for three years.

Be informed that COBRA coverage is liable to extension from 18 to 29 months in case the qualifying event is the reduction of hours, quitting or termination of employee. However, in such a scenario, the beneficiary should either have a disability at the time of the qualifying event or he/ she accidentally becomes disabled during the first 60 days of COBRA coverage.

Last, but definitely not least, for more information about how long COBRA benefits last in California, kindly do not hesitate contacting us.

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It is confusing when trying to assess part-time employee benefits in the United States. This is because the state does not offer clear guideline on what benefits part time employees can be offered. Employers have great flexibility when it comes to the type of benefits they will give to their employees.

Before you hire a part time employee, it is very necessary for you to specify the number of hours you will expect the employee to work in a given day. Most employers offer 20 hours of work per week. The United States bureau of statistics and economics describes part time workers as employees who work for a maximum of 34 hours in a week. The federal wage, hour law and fair labor standards does not declare the maximum number of hours a part time employee will work per week.

It does not matter the type of benefit you offer your employees. You may be offering benefits such as workers compensation, social security, insurance, disability insurance among other benefits. You should design your package in such a way you will attract more qualified employees to stick to your company and avoid your competitors who may be after stealing them from your company.

Factors to consider when coming up with employees benefits

Health Insurance

Health insurance can be offered to full time employees as well as part time employees. The way you will structure the benefits will make part time employees stick to your company. There are provisions such as affordable care act which define how the package can be offered to your employees.

Retirement Plans

Under the employee retirement income security act, small business owners are required to include part time employees in a retirement plan such as 401(k). This will depend on the number of hours the employee will work per week. This is just like the case of health insurance.

Unemployment Benefits

The part time employees will be required by law to access part time benefits as per the state which they work in. In order to get all details about the type of benefits you will access, just refer to the state agency.

Overtime Laws

Just like full time employees are paid overtime, the part time employees should be paid basing on the same formula. Any hours beyond 40 hours of work time in a week should be paid at a rate one and half times the usual rates the employees are paid.

Special Benefits

Some of the special benefits offered to part time employee include sick days, paid vacation, personal days, telecommuting option, reimbursement, tickets to sporting events among other benefits. The number of hours an employee work in a week defines the way the benefits will be offered.

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