Lincoln Absence Advisor
Lincoln Absence Advisor
Compliance News and Updates: March 2022
This episode of Lincoln Absence Advisor provides a new way to digest our monthly leave and absence compliance report. Our reports explore each month’s leave and development news and have proven to be a popular feature – here we talk about the top stories, discuss why new developments are happening, and consider the implications from an employer’s point of view. This month, we’ll review topics such as the U.S. Department of Labor’s initiative to protect warehouse and logistic workers, California’s new FAQs and mandatory poster for the 2022 COVID-19 supplemental paid sick program, and important deadlines you need to know.
Download the March report or visit our webpage to see previous months.
© 2022 Lincoln National Corporation. All rights reserved. LCN-4635760-032322
Hi everyone. This is Karen Batson Marketing Manager at Lincoln Financial Group. And today's episode of Lincoln Absence Advisor is gonna be a little bit different. So we put together a monthly compliance report in it we gather various news of things going on in the leave landscape that we think will be beneficial to you and your leave program. And we've been doing this for the last four years, people seem to really enjoy it seem to find it beneficial. So we thought, let's do an end of the month podcast where we just read out the top stories, maybe have a little bit of a conversation for those who are busy and can't download the full report. What also makes this a little bit different is you're going to actually hear the voice of the man behind the episode Bryan Olivier, my producer is going to keep me on track. Say Hi, Bryan.
Bryan Olivier:Hi, Karen. So hopefully I'll keep you on track, we'll see. Yeah, folks have if they've made it to the end of episodes, maybe they get to hear my legal disclosure.
Karen Batson:That's true. You do an excellent job at the legal disclosure.
Bryan Olivier:Well, thank you. So now I get to be promoted to the to the front of the episode.
Karen Batson:Yes. So your mission is to keep me on track. And to ask me any questions I might miss or you think that's interesting, because we're all at different levels of understanding on the compliance report. Now I sent you the compliance report. Did you actually like read it? Because you're not usually involved in these?
Bryan Olivier:Yeah, you know, I looked at it. And, I've got a pretty good idea of some of the high level topics, I think we'll see.
Karen Batson:A little different than what you're used to working on, right?
Bryan Olivier:Yep. Yep. All good.
Karen Batson:So listeners to give you a little bit more background on this compliance report. So if you would like to get a copy of this month's report or ongoing, we do email them out at the end of every month. Usually, it's the last Tuesday of the month. If you want a copy of it, reach out to our Lincoln benefits professional. Use my name say Karen Batson sent me, we're now closely connected, you can use my name, and they'll reach out to me, we'll make sure you're on the distribution list. I'm also going to add a link to the March report in the show notes so you can check out all the stuff that we're talking about today. Um, alright.
Bryan Olivier:Alright. So speaking of keeping you on track, we want to make this a short episode. So we should probably get started.
Karen Batson:Yeah, that's true. Let's jump in.
Bryan Olivier:First, there was an update from the Department of Labor about a warehouse and logistics workers initiative.
Karen Batson:There was the DOL announced the warehouse and logistics workers Initiative, which aims to protect the rights of workers in these industries. These rights include being paid all legally earned wages, safety from workplace harassment and retaliation, and the right to take leave from work under the Family and Medical Leave Act or FMLA without barriers. The initiative includes educating workers outreach and strict enforcement to improve compliance and decrease the number of violations in these industries.
Bryan Olivier:So why this initiative now?
Karen Batson:Well, I was actually reading the press release. And I thought it'd be good to read this quote from acting Wage and Hour Division administrator Jessica Lumen, as to kind of why this is coming about. So the pandemic highlighted the vital role warehouse workers, delivery drivers, truck drivers and others in the warehousing and logistics industries play in supporting our nation's homes, businesses and economy. These essential workers ensure medical supplies, construction materials, food and clothing, and many other necessities of daily life arrived, where they are needed. And the Wage and Hour Division will use all of its tools to ensure employers comply with federal labor laws and pay workers their hard earned wages. But that summed up probably why this is coming forward right now.
Bryan Olivier:Yeah. So it's kind of interesting. I mean, just think about the last two years and all the deliveries that have been made, right. I know, I get packages several times a week, right? Maybe Maybe every day, some weeks. I guess I'm just a little surprised something like this was already in place.
Karen Batson:I think it's more important that it's just being brought up to be highlighted, like the the part of strict enforcement to improve it just means that there's going to be stronger visibility to it. So from an employer's perspective, it's really important for them to go back and look at their practices and their processes to make sure they're in compliance given this new information, and quite honestly, talk to their legal counsel, talk about what the implications might be proactively and start working towards this effort.
Bryan Olivier:So moving on to some new information from California on the COVID-19 supplemental paid sick leave program, what's going on there?
Karen Batson:All right, the Department of Industrial Relations or DIR published new FAQs and a mandatory poster for the 2022 COVID-19 supplemental paid sick leave program. So to recap California employers in the public and private sectors with more than 25 employees are required to provide their full time employees up to 40 hours of COVID-19. Related sick leave with an additional 40 hours for a positive test from January 1, 2022 through September 30, 2022. The FAQ is address questions around mandatory employer coverage qualifying leave reasons leave entitlement calculation and other specific details implementing SPSL or supplemental paid sick leave. In addition, employers are required to display the mandatory 2022 SPSL poster at a worksite or provide the poster electronically. The full text of the FAQs and poster are available on the California website and we do have a link to that in the report. You can find it on page six.
Bryan Olivier:How many FAQ's are we talking about here? Are there a lot of them?
Karen Batson:I did go and check out these questions before we went to record this podcast. There's 38 questions. A couple of categories of questions were things like permissive limits on use and verification enforcement relation to other laws.
Bryan Olivier:So what kind of things or what kind of questions came up under enforcement?
Karen Batson:All right, let me look. I should have some pages ready here. So enforcement has a few questions. Like what notice most employers provide to cover employees, about 2022 COVID-19, which is kind of a bit what we just went over with the poster. What rights does a covered employee have if the covered employee suffers retaliation, like getting fired for using paid sick leave under local state or federal law, as well as where can a covered employee file a claim if the covered employee was not allowed to use or was not paid for 2022 COVID-19, supplemental paid sick leave? So some good questions, probably some answers that people will need to reference at some points.
Bryan Olivier:Yeah, for sure. So, so let's keep it moving. And so next up, they were a couple of key date reminders coming out of Massachusetts and the District of Columbia. So what can you share about that?
Karen Batson:So the Massachusetts Executive Office for Administration and Finance provided notice to employers that Massachusetts COVID-19 Emergency paid sick leave program would be ending on March 15, 2022, which is now past. Employers may continue to seek reimbursement from the Commonwealth for qualifying leave costs taken between May 28, 2021 and March 15, 2022. Applications for reimbursement must be submitted by April 29, 2022. And you can get more information on the Massachusetts emergency paid sick leave website, which we do, again have linked on page six of the March compliance report. The other date has to do with the District of Columbia. So on February 18, 2022, temporary legislation DC bill number 24 - 0405, which extended the DC COVID-19 FMLA program became effective. The DC COVID-19 FMLA provisions are effective retroactively from November 5, 2021, until October 1, 2022. And again, there's more information on the DC Office of Human Rights website, we have a link on page six for anyone who needs to reference that information.
Bryan Olivier:This next update is pretty interesting. And it's a bit different from what we've been talking about so far. I guess maybe you call it in the news? Maybe that's what it's called. I don't know. Or better yet, maybe true crime stories. So, so what did you want to highlight here, Karen?
Karen Batson:Oh, I didn't come prepared to have a true crime discussion. So we'll stick with the story that we have. One of the other things some folks may not know, we include in the compliance report is when there are various things in the news, such as like court cases, or those sorts of things that might provide some insights or perspective on leave or disability in the workplace. You know, we try and highlight those stories. So I thought we'd cover one here. So an example story here. The EEOC announced that Ranew's Management Company Inc has agreed to pay a $250,000 settlement in an employment discrimination lawsuit alleging that they terminate an employee due to their disability. The employee disclosed their severe depression diagnosis to their employer and requested three weeks off from work. The company CEO responded to the employee by telling them to take as much time as needed. After six weeks, the employee provided a release to return to work note from the doctor. The CEO then responded that the employee was terminated because the employee couldn't be trusted to perform their job. In addition to monetary relief, the company must create and disseminate ADA policies, post notice, and conduct trainings. The company also agreed to reporting and monitoring by the EEOC. I feel like we have lots of conversations about this type of thing in our webinar series. I just how important your policies are, how clear you are, how important communication is to everything in regards to being compliant, because there just can be bigger effects, you know, when when you can't adhere to it. And these stories that we include in the compliance report are great examples of that. And good reminders that it's always good to look back at what your your practices are.
Bryan Olivier:Are there stories like this every month?
Karen Batson:Pretty much, obviously, the compliance report is based off what's happened in the leave landscape at that point. So if there are no stories worth putting in there, then there won't be. But typically, there's at least one example in there. March's actually has two examples. So there's another case that we have in the report, you have to download a read, you have to go to the show notes and read. So March's report is actually a little bit shorter than our typical reports. Our reports can span from five pages to 15 pages, depending on what's going on. I'm kind of excited to do these episodes, because their episodes, I won't even know what we're talking about Bryan until right before we record. Um, so it's kind of a learning experience for me, and you, as well as just kind of talk through this and get the stories out there. For our listeners, again, we do this every month, we really do try and compile things that are beneficial to you. So I do recommend checking it out. If you haven't before, we've been doing this report for a long time. I know that people find it valuable, I get a lot of emails, a lot of comments from folks. Every time we send one out.
Bryan Olivier:I hear about it a lot to actually, in some of the other work that I do. I do. hear reference to the these compliance reports, and the Lincoln Absence Advisor sort of name attached to it.
Karen Batson:Love that! Um, so the other thing I want to leave you all with is, you know, we're almost one month in on season three of Lincoln bsence Advisor podcast. A little less than actually. Next episode we just recorded and it was so good. I'm so excited for y'all to hear it. We're gonna cover FMLA. And what does job protection mean? We brought in three guests, one from our legal department, one from our product department and one from our claims department to kind of bring three perspectives to the question, we had a really great conversation about what that means and what examples are out there and just what it means to today's environment. So definitely look for that. That'll be coming out mid April. Also in April, we'll have another one of these episodes at the end of the month, where we'll review top stories from the April compliance report. Bryan, will you be back to keep me on track?
Bryan Olivier:I would love to this is this is fun to be on this side of things. So, thank you.
Karen Batson:People are gonna get used to your voice here. All right. As always, we'd love to hear from you and what you think of the episode you can do that by rating us, sharing the episode or even reaching out to your Lincoln benefits professional to say which episode you enjoyed or whether it was the whole series of course you can also follow us on any podcast application, Apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen.
Disclosures:The information contained in this podcast is for general use and is not a substitute for the advice of an attorney or your human resource professional. Lincoln Financial Group is the marketing name for Lincoln National Corporation and its affiliates. Affiliates are separately responsible for their own financial and contractual obligations.