Highlights
Impacted Employers:All employers with employees in California
Effective Date:Feb. 1, 2026
Summary:California has enacted legislation that will require employers to provide a new stand-alone written notice annually to each employee and to each new employee at the time of hire, informing them of their rights under state and federal law.
Next Steps:Watch for the state to release a template notice and then provide it to employees and new hires as required.
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The Details
Senate Bill 294
On or before Feb. 1, 2026, and annually thereafter, an employer must provide a new stand-alone written notice to each current employee in a manner the employer normally uses to communicate employment-related information. This may include, but is not limited to, personal service, email, or text message, if it can reasonably be anticipated to be received by the employee within one business day of sending.
Employers must also provide a notice to each new employee upon hire.
Written notice must also be provided annually to the employee’s authorized representative, if any, by either electronic or regular mail.
The Labor Commissioner’s office is required to post on its website a template notice on or before Jan. 1, 2026. The office must update the template annually thereafter.
The Labor Commissioner’s office must make the template available in different languages, including English, Spanish, Chinese, Tagalog, Vietnamese, Korean, Hindi, Urdu, and Punjabi. The Labor Commissioner may also provide the template notice in additional languages.
On or before July 1, 2026, the Labor Commissioner’s office must develop a video for employees advising them of their rights and develop a video for employers advising them of their rights and requirements in those areas.
Notice Contents
The notice must contain a description of workers’ rights in the following areas:
- The right to workers’ compensation benefits, including disability pay and medical care for work-related injuries or illness, as well as the contact information for the California Division of Workers’ Compensation.
- The right to notice of inspection by immigration agencies under state law.
- Protection against unfair immigration-related practices against a person exercising their rights.
- The right to organize a union or engage in concerted activity in the workplace.
- Constitutional rights when interacting with law enforcement at the workplace, including an employee’s right under the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures and rights under the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution to due process and against self-incrimination.
The notice must also contain both of the following:
- A description of new legal developments pertaining to laws enforced by the Labor and Workforce Development Agency that the Labor Commissioner deems material and necessary. The Labor Commissioner must include a list of those developments, if any, in the template notice.
- A list, developed by the Labor Commissioner, of the enforcement agencies that may enforce the underlying rights in the notice. The Labor Commissioner must also include this list in the template notice.
Other Rules
The written notice must be provided to an employee in the language the employer normally uses to communicate employment-related information to the employee and which the employee understands if the template notice is available in that language on the Labor
Commissioner’s website.
If the template notice isn’t available in that language, the written notice may be provided in English.
An employer may, in addition to the required written notice, choose to provide a link to, or show, the video to be developed by the Labor Commissioner’s office.
An employer must keep records of compliance with the requirements of Senate Bill 294 for three years, including the date that each written notice is provided or sent.
The law also includes requirements for situations in which an employee is arrested or detained at the worksite or during work hours. For example, employers must provide each employee with an opportunity to name an emergency contact for such situations no later than March 30, 2026, or their date of hire, whichever is later. See the text of the law for details.
Next Steps
Employers should monitor the Labor Commissioner’s website for the release of the template notice and then provide a compliant notice to employees and new hires as required.