We are in an extremely challenging time in terms of the labor market. The economic recovery has many employers hiring, but they cannot find nearly enough qualified applicants. The Job Openings and Labor Turnover Report by the U.S. Bureau of…
HR Management Matters Archives
BENEFIT PLAN NOTICES…NO GOOD DEED GOES UNPUNISHED, Part 3
Sadly, one of your employees has decided to move on for a new opportunity. Now that they have left, you have no further responsibilities for benefit plan notices, right? Nope, there are still several required notices for which you are…
Posted in Benefits Management, HR Legal & Compliance
BENEFIT PLAN NOTICES…NO GOOD DEED GOES UNPUNISHED, Part 2
Your employee has been onboarded, you provided all of the disclosures for health and welfare plans as required, and now you can sit back and contemplate a job well done. Don’t contemplate too long because your disclosure tasks have just…
Posted in Benefits Management, HR Legal & Compliance
EXPANSION OF CALIFORNIA FAMILY RIGHTS LAWS
BACKDROP Small employers typically do not have the same level of in-house HR Management expertise as do their large corporate counterparts. Also, they do not usually have the financial resources to engage law firms specializing in employment law. As a…
Posted in HR Legal & Compliance
THE PRO ACT—BAD NEWS FOR EMPLOYERS
On March 9th, the U.S. House of Representatives passed H.R. 842, the Protecting the Right to Organize (referred to as “PRO”) Act. The PRO Act is by far the most pro-labor union legislation in many decades. It reflects the pledge…
Posted in Employee & Labor Relations, HR Legal & Compliance
BENEFIT PLAN NOTICES…NO GOOD DEED GOES UNPUNISHED
This is never truer than for employers that offer health and welfare and/or retirement benefits to employees. Your reward for spending a lot of money, aside from providing employees with valued benefits, is an endless series of regulations and requirements.…
Posted in Benefits Management, HR Legal & Compliance
FINALLY SOME CLARIFICATION…INDEPENDENT CONTRACTOR OR EMPLOYEE?, PART 1
This question of an individual is an independent contractor or an employee has never really had a clear answer. As the nature of our economy and how work is performed has evolved (and will continue to do so), the answer…
Posted in HR Legal & Compliance
A BENEFITS MANAGEMENT CHALLENGE: NON-DISCRIMINATION TESTING
There are various complex non-discrimination provisions that apply to self-funded health plans, cafeteria plans, HRAs, and health care and dependent care FSAs. These include IRC Section 105(h), IRC Section 125, and ACA. The purpose is to ensure that HCEs and…
Posted in Benefits Management, HR Legal & Compliance
A WAY YOUR HEALTHCARE COSTS RISE
An employee questioned why he had received a check for $37,000 from the medical insurer. He did not understand why the insurance carrier was not, as he was used to happening, paying the bill. The only recent medical services that…
Posted in Benefits Management
THE INTERSECTION OF POLITICS & THE WORKPLACE, PART 3
As November 3rd is only several days away, we are being bombarded with TV ads, radio ads, political rallies and pollster phone calls. It would be naive and unwise to believe this is not spilling over into our workplaces. So…
Posted in HR Legal & Compliance