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Each month, Mployer Advisor collects and presents some of the most relevant and most pressing recent changes in law, compliance, and policy in areas related to employee benefits, health care, and human resources.
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) is collecting data and conducting research into heat-related illness and injuries that occur on the job with an aim to establish a new standard that can help reduce the number of incidences of these kinds of heat-caused accidents.
As one component of their research process, OSHA will be hosting Small Business Advocacy Review Panels this summer in order to bring together commercial and governmental representatives to share their insight and experience with the aim of helping shape the new standards while creating minimal disruption to business workflow.
While representatives from any and all industries are welcome to participate, the most-sought-after input is from people involved in the industries where heat exposure illnesses are most common and dangerous, such as agriculture, landscaping, construction, manufacturing, warehousing, oil and gas, utilities, waste management, and food services - particularly restaurants with hot kitchen working spaces.
Minnesota is the latest state to enact new paid family and medical leave legislation.
Under the newly signed law, employees will be able to take up to 12 weeks for personal medical issues per year as well as 12 weeks per year for caretaking, bonding with newborns, managing emergencies, and other qualifying circumstances. That said, in any given year, each employee is limited to 20 weeks of paid leave total under this bill.
These new provisions will become available to qualifying applicants beginning in the fall of 2026.
You can read more about this legislation including how payments are calculated here.
A medical practice in North Carolina had submitted what it believed to be all the necessary paperwork in order to renew its cybersecurity insurance, but the policy lapsed just two days before the company suffered a serious ransomware attack.
Given that recovery from the attack cost the practice more than $300 thousand on top of nearly $700 thousand in lost revenue while their internal systems were out of operation, the practice is now suing their insurance provider for negligence in failing to inform them of the lapse in coverage with sufficient notice to prevent it.
While the insurer has not yet commented publicly on the matter, a cybersecurity expert in the field claimed that the depth of infrastructure analysis and risk assessment required before a policy can be issued or renewed would have made it unrealistic to renew a policy effective immediately, and any accidental lapses/gaps in coverage as a result can instantly become extremely costly mistakes.
You can read more about that case and its implications here.
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