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Effective Tuesday, March 17, 2020, San Francisco, Alameda, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Santa Cruz, Marin, and Contra Costa counties imposed Shelter-In-Place Orders. These Orders require all individuals ordered to shelter in place in their residences and for businesses to cease all activities at facilities located within the listed counties and with certain exceptions for: (1) “Essential Businesses” (as defined by the Orders); and (2) “Minimum Basic Operations” for businesses that do not qualify as “Essential Businesses.” The Shelter-In-Place Orders currently remain in effect through April 7. At this time, Napa, Solano, and Sonoma counties have not issued similar mandates.

The intent of the Orders is to ensure the maximum number of people self-isolate in their places of residence to the maximum extent feasible, while enabling essential services to continue, and to slow the spread of Coronavirus (also known as COVID-19) to the maximum extent possible. Although each of the seven Bay Area counties issued a separate Order, the substantive terms of the Orders are the same.

What Businesses are Covered by the Orders?

All businesses with a facility in the above-listed counties, except for “Essential Businesses,” are covered by the Orders. The Orders list 21 categories of Essential Businesses, ranging from healthcare operations and hardware stores to businesses that ship or deliver goods directly to residences. Employees of Essential Businesses may perform travel to/from and related to the Essential Business. The full list of Essential Businesses may be found here:

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Continue Reading Shelter-In-Place Orders Take Effect In The San Francisco Bay Area

Public school teachers, police, firefighters, and other state and local government employees accept their jobs with the understanding that their relatively low salaries are backed up by excellent pension benefits. In July 2019, Moody’s Investors Service estimated that U.S. public pensions are underfunded by $4.4 trillion. U.S. public pension underfunding is larger than the…

Join us on January 28, 2020 for our California Employment Compensation Update in Los Angeles.

We’ll clarify the impact of employment and compensation developments in California, the US and abroad that raise opportunities for the visionary companies that seize them.

We will offer a choice between two sessions:

1. Predictions for the Year Ahead in…

Mark your calendars for a new law prohibiting “no-rehire” provisions in settlement agreements. California Governor Gavin Newsom signed Assembly Bill No. 749 into law on October 12, 2019. Effective January 1, 2020, “no-rehire” provisions are void as a matter of law in California.
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Continue Reading New Law For 2020 Prohibits “No-Rehire” Provisions

“Rowdy” Roddy Piper famously said: “Just when they think they have the answers, I change the questions.”

California employers can relate to this feeling of uncertainty, given a recent trend of California appellate decisions that have upended established legal “answers” regarding certain employment law issues. Following last year’s decision by the California Supreme Court in Dynamex to adopt a new “ABC test” to determine employment status under the Wage Order, and the Court of Appeal’s decision in AMN Healthcare that cast doubt 33 on years of established authority regarding non-solicitation of employee provisions, the Court of Appeal in Ward v. Tilly’s, Inc. recently adopted a new standard for reporting time pay. Because disputes over reporting time pay may lead to putative class action claims, this decision is particularly important for California employers.

California is one of a few states requiring employers to pay a certain minimum amount to nonexempt employees as “reporting time” (also referred to as “show-up pay”) if the employee reports to work but does not actually work the expected number of hours. Specifically, each of California’s Industrial Welfare Commission wage orders requires employers to pay employees “reporting time pay” for each workday “an employee is required to report for work and does report, but is not put to work or is furnished less than half said employee’s usual or scheduled day’s work.”

In Ward v. Tilly’s, a divided Court of Appeal has expanded the “reporting time” obligation to situations where employees are required to contact their employer two hours before on-call shifts—even though they never actually physically report to work.

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Continue Reading Uncertainty For Retailers: California Court Adopts New Reporting Time Pay Obligations For Employees Who Phone It In

To help multi-state employers determine the minimum amount they must pay non-exempt employees, our chart below summarizes state and local increases this year. (Unless otherwise indicated, the following increases are effective January 1, 2019.)

This chart is intended to discuss rate changes that affect employers generally, and may not necessarily cover all industry-specific rate changes.

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Continue Reading New Year, New Minimum Wage Rates Across The US

Join us at 3:00 pm Thursday, January 24 for our California Employment & Compensation Update in our new Los Angeles office. A range of topics will be covered during our program which will begin with a panel discussion addressing emerging trends in advancing corporate Diversity & Inclusion goals, followed by your choice of updates on…

This month California’s Department of Fair Employment and Housing released an updated Sexual Harassment Poster and Brochure.

Either the poster or the brochure can be distributed to employees to meet legal requirements.

For more on new obligations for California employers with respect to sexual harassment

As we previously discussed here, the United States Supreme Court’s May 2018 decision in Epic Systems v. Lewis was a clear win for employers that seek to avoid the expense and disruption of class litigation by resolving disputes individually through binding arbitration. As explained by the Supreme Court in AT&T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion, “[i]n bilateral arbitration, parties forego the procedural rigor and appellate review of the courts in order to realize the benefits of private dispute resolution: lower costs, greater efficiency and speed, and the ability to choose expert adjudicators to resolve specialized disputes.”

For employers looking to take advantage of the benefits of individual arbitration, there are several drafting nuances to consider before rolling out or updating existing arbitration agreements.

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Continue Reading You Had Me At “Class Action Waiver”