California has created a website for employers to stay up to date on COVID-19 workplace requirements, safety procedures, employee training, and protocols in the case of an infection or outbreak. The website also has an employer portal where California employers can get a tailored roadmap for guideline compliance.

Cal/OSHA Emergency Temporary Standards

If an employee is sick or exposed to COVID-19, the employer must determine when the sick employee was last in the workplace, and whether any other employees may have been exposed to COVID-19, e.g. whether there were other persons within 6 feet of the sick employee for a duration of over 15 minutes within any 24-hour period. The employer must offer testing to any potentially-exposed employees, at no cost, during normal working hours. Any employees who test positive or are exposed to COVID-19 should be excluded from the workplace. The website lists the health criteria that employees must meet before they are allowed to return to the workplace. The employer must also follow all recordkeeping and reporting requirements, by notifying Cal/OSHA immediately when there is a serious illness or fatality due to COVID-19.

Pay, Benefits, and Sick Leave

The employer must follow the requirements to preserve the employees’ pay and benefits. Workers in California can earn one (1) hour of regular paid sick leave for every thirty (30) hours worked. California employers must allow employees to take at least twenty-four (24) hours or three (3) days of sick leave per year, whichever is greater.

Workers’ Compensation

California passed a law in September 2020 (Senate Bill 1159) that creates a rebuttable presumption that if certain categories of employees contract COVID-19, the contraction is presumed to be work-related and therefore the employee is entitled to workers’ compensation. The first presumption applies to first responders and healthcare workers.

The second presumption applies to employers with five (5) or more employees. If a certain number of employees (depending on the employer size) test positive for COVID-19 during a continuous fourteen (14) day period, employers are required to report all employee infections to their workers’ compensation insurer. The employer can present evidence regarding any steps taken to reduce workplace transmission in order to rebut the presumption that the transmission was work-related.