By Bradley Cave

After days of uncertainty and looming deadlines created by the Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA), the DOL has finally issued some definitive regulatory guidance, as well as twenty new Q&As to its list of non-regulatory guidance. You can read the Q&As and access the final regulations at the DOL’s website. But, if you have had enough of the daily changes, we offer the following summary of the new Q&As and the regulations:

Stay-at-Home Orders. A “Federal, state or local quarantine or isolation order” as used in the definitions of qualifying reasons for leave under the Paid Sick Leave Act, includes shelter-in-place or stay-at-home orders that cause an employee to be unable to work, and employees can take paid sick leave for this reason if the employer has work for the employee to do. The supplementary information DOL published with the final rules explains that quarantine and isolation orders include “a broad range of governmental orders.” The regulations also state a bright line rule that paid sick leave can be used only if the employee would have been able to perform work at the worksite or by teleworking but for the quarantine or isolation order. If the employer does not have work for the employee to do regardless of the shelter-in-place or stay-at-home order, the employee is not eligible for paid sick leave. Read more