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You are here: Home / Archives for topics / Workplace safety
WORKPLACE SAFETY

Mandatory COVID vaccination: new guidance & update

February 21, 2021 by

By Lynne Curry bio Can employers require their employees to receive COVID-vaccinations? While vaccination is one of an employer’s best tools for preventing COVID-19 outbreaks at their worksites, requiring employees to be vaccinated and disciplining them if they refuse comes with legal risks. Although the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC)’s December 2020 guidelines stated that employers could implement and enforce mandatory COVID-19 vaccination policies for certain jobs and with certain exceptions1, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) requires that recipients of vaccines under an “emergency use authorization” (which includes the current COVID vaccines) must be informed that they have the option to accept or refuse the vaccination. For more detail on this federal agency contradiction, see https://workplacecoachblog.com/2021/01/covid-vaccination-update-in-light-of-the-vaccines-emergency-use-authorization-status/ “The current problem,” says Perkins Coie Senior Counsel Michael O’Brien, “is that many employees… . . . read more

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Voluntary COVID-19 vaccination policy

February 19, 2021 by

It is important for you to ensure that your law office workers get vaccinated against COVID-19 to protect not only themselves but also co-workers, clients and others at your facility. But what if employees neglect or just plain refuse to be vaccinated? There are two basic options: Option 1: Require workers to be vaccinated Option 2: Encourage workers to be vaccinated voluntarily Here’s a Model Policy you can use to implement Option 2.

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Worker’s acknowledgement of decision to decline COVID-19 vaccination

February 15, 2021 by

It is important for you to ensure that law office workers get vaccinated against COVID-19 to protect not only themselves but also co-workers, patients and others at your facility. But what if workers neglect or just plain refuse to be vaccinated? There are two basic options: Option 1: Require workers to be vaccinated Option 2: Encourage workers to be vaccinated voluntarily If you select Option 2, require workers to sign a form acknowledging that they were offered the vaccine and voluntarily declined to accept it and list the reasons for doing so. Here’s a Model Policy you can adapt.

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Mandatory COVID-19 vaccination policy

February 6, 2021 by

It is important to ensure your law office workers get vaccinated against COVID-19 to protect not only themselves but also co-workers, clients and others at your office. But what if employees neglect or just plain refuse to be vaccinated? There are two basic options: Option 1: Require workers to be vaccinated Option 2: Encourage workers to be vaccinated voluntarily Here’s a Model Policy you can use to implement Option 1.

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MANAGING STAFF

Disciplining employees for not following COVID-19 restrictions when they are off-duty

February 6, 2021 by

Picture this: COVID-19 cases are surging. Your state or city is in full lockdown mode. That means, among other things, that outdoor gatherings of more than 50 people aren’t allowed. So, it disturbs you to turn on the Sunday news and see hundreds of people crowding together to demonstrate right in the middle of downtown. And then it gets personal. You recognize one of those demonstrators. She’s one of your office’s employees! What the heck is she doing there?! And, gulp, you also notice that she’s not wearing a mask! Now what? Can you discipline the employee for participating in the illegal demonstration and not wearing a mask? Off-duty conduct, employee discipline and COVID-19 The statement that what employees do when they’re away from work is none of your business… . . . read more

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COMPLIANCE

Can you require staff to get the COVID-19 vaccination?

January 30, 2021 by

Although it’s clearly a positive development for the world at large, the almost miraculous emergence of a vaccine for COVID-19 in less than a year poses legal challenges for. The Question: Can employers require their workers to get the vaccine? Bottom Line on Top: The answer is probably but not 100 percent certainly YES. And even if a mandatory vaccine policy is justifiable, it’s also subject to strict restrictions.  Legal justification for mandatory vaccination policies Even though the COVID-19 situation is new and unprecedented, we can still discern the boundaries with regard to employers’ rights to demand that workers get vaccinated. Specifically, we know that OSHA, courts and arbitrators have historically upheld mandatory flu vaccination policies (as well as their slightly less restrictive cousin, the vaccination-or-mask policy requiring all employees… . . . read more

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EMPLOYMENT LAW UPDATE

New rules for wellness programs & marijuana legal in more places

January 30, 2021 by

By Mike O’Brien bio Employment law continues to change rapidly with a change in federal government administration and the continuing pandemic. As manager of a law office, it’s just one more thing to keep up with. Here are a few recent developments.  New rules coming for employer wellness programs On Jan. 7, 2021, the EEOC issued proposed rules related to what incentives employers can offer as part of wellness programs. The new rules come in response to a decision of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia that vacated a portion of the EEOC’s previous ADA and GINA regulations. HIPAA allows employers to offer incentives up to 30 percent of the total cost of health insurance to encourage participation in certain types of wellness programs. However, the ADA… . . . read more

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WORKPLACE SAFETY

Has OSHA done enough to enforce COVID-19 safety rules?

January 25, 2021 by

Even after the election and swearing in of the new President, federal government response to the COVID-19 pandemic remains a politically charged issue. One area of contention involves whether OSHA has done enough to protect workers exposed to the virus. On Jan. 8, the agency issued a statistical report documenting its COVID-19 enforcement efforts starting with the beginning of the pandemic and running through Dec. 31, 2020. Employer liability for COVID-19 violations under OSHA laws Nobody disputes that under OSHA, law offices and other employers have a duty to protect workers from risk of COVID-19 infection. What may be less clear, is the source of that duty. Neither the Occupational Safety and Health Act (Act) nor the regulations say anything about COVID-19 or, with a few exceptions, infectious illnesses in… . . . read more

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WORKPLACE SAFETY

What do we do about employees who refuse vaccination?

January 25, 2021 by

By Lynne Curry bio Question: What do we do if our employees refuse to get vaccinated? Several dozen employees have stated they don’t want the vaccine, as doctors don’t know enough about the vaccine’s long-term side effects. They point out that the Food and Drug Administration sanctioned the vaccines through an emergency use authorization procedure and rushed the vaccines through. We run a mid-sized practice.  Our management team read your Dec. 21 post about mandatory COVID-19 vaccination policies. https://workplacecoachblog.com/2020/12/mandatory-covid-vaccinations-the-rules/ Now that vaccinations are starting, we’re considering a mandatory policy for safety reasons. How are other employers handling this? Answer: As a management team, you’re not alone in your concerns. Surveys by both the Employee Benefit Research Institute and Pew reveal that 21% to 24% of U.S. adults “will not get… . . . read more

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EMPLOYMENT LAW UPDATE

How HR regulations could change under Biden administration

November 20, 2020 by

By Mike O’Brien bio Employers may be wondering how a Biden administration will affect workplace laws. Prior to the election, Biden’s campaign website gives some clues as to his priorities in this area. Biden lists the failure to pay minimum wage and overtime pay, forcing off-the-clock work, and misclassifying workers as problems resulting in billions of dollars a year in wage theft. To address those issues, he proposes a phased-in implementation of a $15 per hour federal minimum wage (including eliminating the tip credit). He also supports the adoption of a more stringent test for classifying workers as independent contractors, similar to the ABC test employed by California. This type of test would almost certainly result in many more workers being deemed employees and fewer being properly classified as independent… . . . read more

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