Beginning January 1, 2012, California employers face new statutory obligations to notify non-exempt NEW HIRE employees of their rate of pay and compensation. To ensure employees clearly understand their compensation rates, and in furtherance of the general public policy California endorses requiring reasonable notice to employees of any change in a term of employment, California employers must now provide written disclosure of general employment information (as described below) to non-exempt employees at the time of their hire. AB 469 further requires that employers provide written notice to its current employees within seven (7) days of any change to the general employment information employers are now required to report.
Pursuant to new Labor Code § 2810.5, employers must provide written disclosures that contain the following information:
- The rate or rates of pay and basis thereof, whether paid by the hour, shift, day, week, salary, piece, commission, or otherwise, including any rates for overtime as applicable.
- Allowances, if any, claimed as part of the minimum wage, including meal or lodging allowances. This requires description of any other form of compensation the employer provides other than base salary, such as per diem amounts or travel expense budgets.
- The regular paydays the employer designates as required under Labor Code § 204.
- The name, aliases, physical address, and telephone number of the employer.
- The name, address, and telephone number of the employer’s workers’ compensation insurance carrier.
- Any other information the Labor Commissioner deems material and necessary.
This new notification obligation does not extend to employees exempt from payment of overtime wages by statute or wage order, employees of the state or any political subdivision thereof, or to employees covered by a collective bargaining agreement that expressly provides for wages, hours of work, working conditions, and provides for premium wage rates for overtime worked. Failure to comply with the new law subjects an employer to penalties provided for in the California Labor Code for statutory violations. Of important note is the fact that AB 469 extended the statute of limitations for the Division of Labor Standards Enforcement (“DLSE”) to collect statutory penalties from one year to three years, thus allowing potential recovery for claims under this new law to exist for three years.
To assist employers in providing the appropriate written notification to its non-exempt employees, the DLSE provides a sample form employers may use to comply with the new Labor Code § 2810.5, which can be found at: http://www.dir.ca.gov/dlse/LC_2810.5_Notice.pdf