The Michigan Legislature held a late-night session Feb. 20 that ultimately led to amending the Earned Sick Time Act (ESTA) set to take effect at 12:01 a.m. on Feb. 21. Multiple amendments were made to House Bill 4002 before it passed the Senate with a bipartisan vote of 26-10 and received a concurrence approval vote from the House. The law is effective now, as it was granted immediate effect by the legislature, signed by Gov. Whitmer the morning of Feb. 21 and officially filed with the Office of the Great Seal.

While the new law may still present implementation challenges for hospitals, many positive changes were made, which include altering how much time must be provided by employers of various sizes and rewriting how employers must administer the law.

Important changes include:

• Eliminating both the private right of action and the rebuttable presumption for terminated employees.
• Explicitly allowing employers to provide all sick time hours frontloaded at the start of the year and exempting those employers from tracking accruals.
• Allowing employers to designate paid time off as a combined paid time off/sick leave bank.
• Requiring reporting for unforeseeable use of sick time by an employee as soon as practicable or in compliance with an employer’s policy on using sick time, if the employer notifies the employee of their policy in writing and the policy allows employees to provide notice after the employee is aware of the need to use sick time.
• Refining the employee...

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