MA Governor Signs Staffing Bill
Table of Contents

Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick signed into law HB 4304 August 6, requiring staffing firms doing business in the state to send temporary employees written notice of each assignment’s wage rate, the starting and end times of the assignment, and the expected duration of the assignment. The law also prohibits staffing firms from charging temporary employees for certain items and services and prohibits fraudulent conduct. The bill will take effect Jan. 31, 2013.

Before the state senate passed the bill this summer, ASA and the Massachusetts Staffing Association, an ASA-affiliated chapter, engaged in prolonged advocacy efforts that resulted in “professional” employees, secretaries, and administrative assistants being exempted from the notice requirements.

The advocacy efforts also resulted in numerous onerous provisions being struck from the bill, including provisions that would have prohibited staffing firms from permanent placement fees; prohibited staffing firms from sending candidate résumés to clients to generate jobs; imposed potential rate caps; required staffing firms to provide meals, lodging, and transportation expenses to out-of-state

workers whose temporary assignments were cancelled through no fault of the staffing firm; and imposed severe penalties, no matter how small the violation or whether the violation was inadvertent. None of these provisions is included in the law.

The Massachusetts Labor Department will issue the new regulations, and carry out inspections and investigations under the law. ASA and MSA plan to meet with the agency to provide input into the regulatory process.

—Stephen Dwyer

Federal

Legislation Seeks to Ban Discrimination Against Unemployed Individuals .................. 1

EEOC Releases Enforcement Guidance on Arrest and Conviction Records ..................... 2

State

MA Publishes Safety Fact Sheet......................... 2
ASA Lobbying Effort Reduces Impact of
CA Reporting Bill............................................... 3

Court and Agency Actions
Supreme Court Upholds Health
Care Reform Law........................................... 3

CA Upholds Overtime Exemptions for Commissioned Recruiters........................ 3

Social Media in the Workplace: NLRB Weighs In ............................................ 4

Read Staffing Law on ASA Digital

This issue is also available as an online digital edition. ASA Digital offers interactive, page-turning, and mobile-friendly replicas of certain ASA publications at americanstaff-ing.net/digital. These digital publications are supplements to the print editions.

FEDERAL

Legislation Seeks to Ban Discrimination Against Unemployed Individuals

The Fair Employment Opportunity Act, intro-
duced last year, would make it unlawful for an
employment firm to refuse to consider or refer
an individual for employment based on the indi-
vidual’s status as unemployed or to classify indi-
viduals in any manner that may limit their access
to information about jobs because of their sta-
tus as unemployed. The bill would also prohibit
publishing an advertisement or announcement
for a job vacancy stating that only “currently em-
ployed” candidates may apply. The U.S. Equal
Employment Opportunity Commission has held
that such practice could violate EEO laws.