Predictive Scheduling Laws

New laws are being touted at federal, state, and local levels to alter the ways employers schedule workers. Proposed bills  suggest the need to  provide increased predictability to workers' schedules by requiring employers to give employees advance notice of work schedules, pay employees for rescheduling by the employer and so forth.  So far, such proposals have focused on the food service, hospitality, and retail sectors who have fluctuating work schedules.Unions in particular have been pushing for  such legislation.On the other hand, retail and hospitality employers and industry groups, take an inapposite view due in part to the variation in their customer demand. Such employers argue that predictive scheduling  would hamper their businesses by eliminating flexibility 

In January 2015, San Francisco became the first city to pass predictive scheduling laws implementing the Predictable Scheduling and Fair Treatment for Formula Retail Employees Ordinance as part of the city's larger Retail Workers' Bill of Rights aimed at chain stores and restaurants. The ordinance among other things, that employers pay employees for cancelled on-call shifts, provide notice to workers of their biweekly schedules, give new hires written estimates of expected hours and schedules, and offer extra hours to current part-time employees before hiring new workers or utilizing a staffing agency. In September 2016, Seattle  followed with a unanimous vote on its Secure Scheduling Ordinance, which  imposes additional requirements on employers. 

The U.S. Department of Labor has voiced that  it is considering  whether employees should be legally entitled to predictive scheduling under the Fair Labor Standards Act.Predictive scheduling legislation currently is pending at the federal level as well as a the state level in California, Connecticut, Illinois, Indiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Oregon and Rhode Island.