Minnesota: Earned Sick and Safe Time FAQs Released

The Department of Labor and Industry released FAQs providing more detail regarding the state’s Earned Safe and Sick Time (ESST) statute. We covered this law in an article in the June 6, 2023, edition of Compliance Corner. Highlights include:

• Employers may set a cap or limit on each employee’s ESST accrual. Employers must allow each employee to accrue up to at least 48 hours a year, carried over from year to year until an 80-hour maximum accrual is reached. These limits of 48 hours each year and a maximum accrual of 80 hours for each employee may be higher if an employer agrees, but not lower.
• ESST hours accrue on all hours worked, including overtime hours, unless the employee is exempt from earning overtime compensation under exemptions for professional, administrative, and executive employees.
• Employers are not required to allow ESST hours to accrue when an employee is not working, such as when the employee is sick or on vacation.
• ESST must be paid at the hourly rate of pay for the shift for which leave is being used.
• An employer may require an employee to provide reasonable documentation of ESST use only when more than three consecutive days of ESST are used. However, employers cannot require employees to provide specific details about the reason for taking ESST.
• Employees may use ESST at the same time as other leave protected under state or federal law.
• Employers must provide employees with notice of their rights under the ESST law. At the end of each pay period, employers must also provide each employee the total number of sick and safe time hours available for use by the employee and the total number of sick and safe time hours used by the employee in the pay period.

FAQs are not enforceable as rules or statutes; however, they provide clarity regarding the state’s interpretation of the statute. Employees do not have to live in Minnesota to be eligible for ESST accrual but must work at least 80 hours in Minnesota in a year to be eligible. Employers with employees in the state should be aware of these FAQs.

FAQs: Earned State and Sick Time (ESST) »