On November 5, 2024, Missouri voters approved Proposition A, a new law requiring private employers in Missouri to provide paid sick leave to all employees. Certain categories of employees are carved out, including individuals employed by a retail or service business whose annual gross volume sales made or business done is less than five hundred thousand dollars, casual and temporary workers, individuals employed in private residences on an occasional basis, and volunteers.
Under the new law, beginning May 1, 2025, employers must provide one (1) hour of sick leave for every thirty (30) hours worked by an employee, whether the employee is a full-time employee or a part-time employee. For accrual purposes, exempt employees (who are paid on a salary basis) are assumed to work forty (40) hours in each workweek unless their normal work week is less than forty hours, in which case sick leave accrues based upon the employee’s normal workweek.
Sick leave can be used for: (i) the employee’s own mental or physical illness, injury or health condition; (ii) care for a family member with a mental or physical illness, injury, or health condition; (iii) closure of the employee’s workplace by order of a public official due to a public health emergency; (iv) an employee’s need to care for a child whose school or place of care has been closed by order of a public official due to a public health emergency; (v) care for the employee or a family member that is subject to a quarantine order of a public health authority or a healthcare provider; or (vi) when the absence is necessary due to domestic violence, sexual assault, or stalking when the leave is to obtain medical attention, victim services, counseling, relocation, or legal services.
Fortunately, existing policies providing for paid time off (even if not specifically for sick time) will satisfy the new law’s requirements, provided that employees accrue at least the amounts required by the new law under the existing paid time off policy and provided that employees can use the paid time off for the purposes set forth in the new law.
Employees are required to make a good faith effort to provide notice of the need for time off in advance when the need for leave is foreseeable, and employees must make a reasonable effort to schedule the use of sick leave in a manner that does not unduly disrupt the operations of the employer. Where the need for leave is not foreseeable, the employee must provide notice as soon as practicable. Because the need for time off due to illness is often unpredictable, employers should plan to be flexible with respect to the use of sick leave by employees. Employers can require reasonable documentation from an employee confirming that the time off was used for a covered purpose if the employee uses sick leave for three (3) or more consecutive work days.
Employers with fifteen (15) or more employees (counting all full-time, part-time, and temporary workers) can limit employees to using a maximum of fifty-six (56) hours of earned paid sick leave per year, and employers with less than fifteen (15) employees can limit employees to using a maximum of forty (40) hours of earned paid sick leave per year. However, any hours accrued by an employee in excess of these limits must be either carried forward to the following year (up to a maximum of eighty (80) hours of carryover) or must be paid out by the employer at the end of the applicable year. If the employer chooses to pay out accrued, unused sick leave at the end of the year, the employer must also provide the employee with an amount of paid sick time that meets or exceeds the new law’s requirements that is available for the employee’s immediate use at the beginning of the subsequent year.
Paid sick leave will begin to accrue on May 1, 2025 or on commencement of employment, whichever is later, and employees must be allowed to use earned paid sick time as it accrues. This means that employers can no longer impose waiting periods on an employee’s use of paid time off for sickness, even if the employer’s paid time off policy generally requires such a waiting period.
Employers are not required to pay employees for accrued, unused paid sick leave upon termination of employment. However, if an employee is separated from employment (whether through termination or resignation) and is rehired within nine (9) months of the separation date, any previously accrued earned paid sick leave must be reinstated and available for immediate use by the employee.
While many employers already have existing policies for paid time off, employers must review those existing policies to ensure that they comply with all of the requirements of the new law. If those policies do not comply, employers must either revise those existing policies to bring them into compliance with the new law or implement an entirely new paid sick leave policy in accordance with the new law.
Over the next several months, employers must review their existing policies, prepare, and take the necessary steps to bring themselves into compliance with the new law. Employers must provide notice to their employees of the new sick leave benefit on or before April 15, 2025 or within fourteen (14) calendar days of the start of employment, whichever is later and must also begin displaying a poster (along with the other federal and state mandated employment posters) regarding the new law beginning April 15, 2025.
For more information, please contact Theresa Phelps who is a member of our Firm’s labor and employment group.