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California

Employment Lawyer Network:
California

Joseph L. Beachboard (Editor)

California Employment Law

Joe.Beachboard@OgletreeDeakins.com
(213) 239-9800

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Joseph L. Beachboard is a nationally recognized expert on employment law issues who speaks regularly at SHRM and other HR events. He also is a regular contributor to several national and California publications. In 2000, Mr. Beachboard sold The Labor Letters, Inc., a publisher of monthly employment law journals that he founded to advise human resource professionals. He is a founding member and executive director of the Management Employment Law Roundtable, a national, invitation only, organization of management labor and employment lawyers.

If employee won’t admit disability, what are our reasonable accommodation obligations?

02/21/2011
Q. One of our employees is experiencing performance-related problems, which I believe are attributable to a mental disability. However, the worker has not notified anyone here that he suffers from an impairment that substantially limits a major life activity. He hasn’t asked for any accommodations either. Should we nonetheless offer to reasonably accommodate this employee?

How should learning disabilities be documented?

01/28/2011
Q. We have an employee who claims he has a learning disability and needs accommodations. What kind of documentation can we ask for? And do we have to pay for a medical assessment?

Are we allowed to require overtime?

01/28/2011
Q. Right now, we don’t want to hire anyone permanently and think it would be more cost effective to require our employees to work overtime instead. Can we force employees to work overtime?

The postponed Medicare reporting requirement: what you need to know

01/28/2011
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services recently postponed until next year a requirement that certain partially self-insured employers must report any one-time or lump-sum payments to persons entitled to Medicare benefits. The requirement was to have applied to payments made in connection with settlements, judgments or awards involving the release of potential liability for medical expenses.

SoCal fashion company owes $887K in unpaid wages, overtime

01/28/2011
Orange County’s Laundry Room Clothing had a hard time making payroll during the depths of the Great Recession. Now the men’s fashion manufacturer must make amends big time to the employees it stiffed.

Paid organ and marrow donor leave law now in effect

01/28/2011
As of Jan. 1, California employers with 15 or more employees must provide up to 30 days of paid leave to employees making organ donations, and up to five days of paid leave to employees who donate bone marrow.

Study: Paid family leave hasn’t burdened business

01/28/2011
The California Paid Family Leave Law that went into effect in 2004 hasn’t increased employer costs or hurt productivity as critics once predicted, according to a new study.

No litigating related claims in separate venues

01/28/2011
The Court of Appeal of California has ruled that employees can’t pursue related claims in different forums at the same time.

No separate notice for nonmembers required for midyear union dues assessment

01/28/2011
What happens if a union passes a dues increase in the middle of the year—perhaps in an election year? Can the union collect the increased amount and then adjust it at the beginning of the next year? According to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, that’s exactly the way to handle the increase.

Union wants nonmember employee names? Send opt-out forms so employees can choose

01/28/2011

When a union asks an employer for the names and contact information of employees who do not belong to the union, employers must first inform the employees of the request and give them an opportunity to object, according to a recent California Court of Appeal decision.