Maryland
Healthy Working Families Act (House Bill 1) - Enforcement and Implementation
small.business@maryland.gov
Maryland Employers and Employees:
Governor Larry Hogan understands the business community has many
questions regarding the Maryland Healthy Working Families Act, so he established the Office of Small Business Regulatory Assistance
(OSBRA) within the Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation to assist
small businesses in complying with the law, as well as an email address where
employers may direct specific questions: small.business@maryland.gov.
To assist employers with compliance, the
department is developing draft guidance documents and model policies, including
an extensive Q&A document based on questions received through small.business@maryland.gov,
and will continue to provide answers to specific questions upon request. These
documents will be emailed to stakeholders and published to DLLR’s paid leave
website at www.dllr.maryland.gov/paidleave.
Before promulgating official guidance
documents, the department encourages stakeholder input to be certain that the
draft guidance documents address all concerns. Comments on these draft guidance
documents and specific implementation questions should be directed to small.business@maryland.gov.
Following a public comment period, the department will finalize the policies
based on stakeholder input and include any amendments to the Maryland Healthy
Working Families Act from this General Assembly session.
The General Assembly is in session until April
9, 2018, and there are several bills that could affect this legislation.
Although HB1 goes into effect on February 11, 2018, bills have been introduced
that would substantially impact the law.
February 11, 2018 Effective Day: What you need to know
Emergency
legislation to delay implementation of this law until July 1, 2018, is moving
in the Maryland Senate. On Friday, February 2, it passed the Senate Finance
Committee and will next be considered by the full Senate. After that, it would
go to the House of Delegates for consideration. If this bill should pass before
February 11, 2018, the Department of Labor will notify employers. However, in
the event implementation is not delayed, employers should be prepared to begin
tracking sick and safe leave accrual on February 11, 2018.
In
anticipation of the February 11 effective date, the department would like to
highlight the following information for employers. Please
be advised that some of this may be subject to change based on stakeholder
input and any amendments to the law.
●
Employers with 15 or more
employees that do not currently offer at least one hour of paid leave for every
30 hours that an employee works must establish a method to provide employees
with sick and safe leave that is consistent with the law.
○
Accrual will commence on February 11, 2018, when the bill becomes
effective.
●
Employers that have an existing
PTO policy that provides leave in an amount equal to
or greater than the amount
that is provided for under the law do not have to provide additional
leave.
○ The department strongly encourages employers to review their existing policies to
make sure that the amount of leave they provide for, as well as the
terms of
leave usage, are equal to or greater than the leave provided for under
the law.
○
Additionally, the department strongly encourages such employers to
advise employees that sick and safe leave is covered by the existing PTO the
employer
provides and that any additional sick and safe leave will not be
provided.
●
Employers with fewer than 15
employees must allow unpaid sick and safe leave.
○
In determining whether an employer has 15 or more employees, the
department
will consider those employees employed in the state of Maryland.
○
All employees employed in the state of Maryland will count towards this
determination, regardless of hours worked or status within the business.
●
Both paid and unpaid leave will
accrue at the rate of one hour of leave for every 30
hours worked.
○
If an employee works primarily in
another state but performs work in Maryland
that is incidental to his or her
work performed elsewhere, the employee would not
be entitled to accrue sick and
safe leave for those incidental hours or work
performed in Maryland.
○
If an employee performs the
majority of his or her work in Maryland, the
employee is entitled to accrue
sick and safe leave for all time worked including
any incidental work that is
performed in another state.
●
Employers must provide for the
accrual of leave beginning on February 11, 2018.
○
Employees employed for at least
106 days may use leave as it is accrued.
Employees employed less than 106 days
on February 11, 2018, and new
employees hired after February 11, 2018, must
wait 106 days from their date of
hire to begin using leave.
●
Eligible employees are those that
regularly work more than 12 hours a week.
○
For more information on
exemptions, please refer to the Committee on Paid
Leave Final Report HERE.
●
The maximum amount of leave that
an employee can accrue in one year is 40 hours.
●
An employer may elect to “front
load” the leave at the beginning of the year. The leave
would then be available
for immediate use by employees, but employees would not
be permitted to carry
over any unused leave.
○
Employers are permitted to determine their own year for purposes of
leave
calculation.
The department has already received extensive
public comments as well as requests for technical assistance through the
recently established small.business@maryland.gov address. Employers
and employees are encouraged to send specific questions and concerns to this
email address so the department can continue to address any concerns from
stakeholders, and provide guidance on implementation.
You may read a copy of the Maryland Healthy
Working Families Act HERE.
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