NewsBrief – February 2024
In This Issue:
- UPDATE: Paid Leave Oregon Equivalent Plan Reporting due January 2025, not 2024
- New Washington State Law Limits Pre-Employment Marijuana Testing
- DOL Announces Final Rule on Independent Contractors
- Navigating Minimum Wage Increases
- First Survey of 2024 - Q1 HR Trends Report Now Available!
- Payscale Peer Officially Replaces Cascade's Regional Pay Survey
- Celebrating Your Success with Cascade: Gift Card Winners Announced!
- Hot Compliance Question
- Five Things You May Not Know About Brothers Cleaning Service
Compliance Corner: Layoff Guide
Each month, we highlight one of the many resources exclusively available to you as a member of Cascade.
This month, we are featuring our Layoff Guide. Layoffs are never easy but sometimes, they are necessary. This guide will help employers navigate how to conduct proper layoffs while minimizing the potential risks.
UPDATE: Paid Leave Oregon Equivalent Plan Reporting due January 2025, not 2024
Cascade Compliance Team
compliance@cascadeemployers.com
In early January, Cascade sent out an alert with notice that employers with Paid Leave Oregon equivalent plans are required to file their reports with the Oregon Employment Department by January 31, 2024. Subsequently, we contacted Paid Leave Oregon for clarification of information on their website about the reporting requirements.
Although the equivalent plan reporting form is currently on the Paid Leave Oregon website with a due date of January 31, equivalent plan reports will now not be due until January 31, 2025. The reporting for 2025 will require information from both 2023 and 2024. Although we immediately issued a correction, we felt it important to send a final reminder.
Don’t forget to regularly visit Cascade’s Paid Leave Oregon Resource Center for updates.
New Washington State Law Limits Pre-Employment Marijuana Testing
Cascade Compliance Team
compliance@cascadeemployers.com
Effective January 1, 2024, Washington State’s Senate Bill 5123 protects job applicants in Washington State from hiring discrimination if they lawfully use marijuana outside of the workplace. Specifically, SB 5123 makes it illegal to discriminate against an applicant in the initial hiring for employment based upon:
- The person's use of cannabis off the job and away from the workplace; or
- An employer-required drug screening test that has found the person to have nonpsychoactive cannabis metabolites in their hair, blood, urine, or other bodily fluids.
The bill does make some exceptions to the pre-employment cannabis testing including but not limited to positions categorized as "safety sensitive" when impairment while working presents a substantial risk of death. It should be noted that employers must identify these positions before the applicant applies for the position.
Senate Bill 5123 doesn’t prohibit Washington state employers from making hiring decisions based on a person’s use of drugs off the job, aside from marijuana. Additionally, Washington employers may still conduct pre-employment testing for drugs aside from marijuana and employers may also conduct drug tests that include marijuana for post-accident testing, reasonable suspicion, random, and blanket drug testing.
Washington state employers should review their drug and alcohol policy to make sure they are in compliance with this new law. Additionally, Washington state employers should train supervisors and hiring managers on these changes to ensure compliance.
DOL Announces Final Rule on Independent Contractors
Cascade Compliance Team
compliance@cascadeemployers.com
On January 10, 2024, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) published a final rule, revising their guidance on how to analyze whether a worker is an independent contractor or employee under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). This rule goes into effect on March 11, 2024.
The new DOL Independent Contractor Rule returns to the six-factor, totality-of-the-circumstances analysis to determine whether a worker is an independent contractor or employee. The six-factors are as follows:
- Opportunity for profit or loss depending on managerial skill;
- Investments by the worker and the potential employer;
- Degree of permanence of the work relationship;
- Nature and degree of control;
- Extent to which the work performed is an integral part of the potential employer’s business; and
- Skill and initiative.
The final rule goes on to state that no factor or set of factors in the above list has a pre-determined weight and there may also be additional factors that could be relevant to the assessment, such as whether the worker has a business for themselves.
It is important to note that DOL’s independent contractor test only applies to the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and state agencies, such as workers’ compensation divisions and employment departments, typically have different independent contractor requirements. The various Oregon independent contractor laws can be found here and Washington’s independent contractor requirements can be found here. Employers who use independent contractors should re-examine their worker classifications in light of this new rule to make sure they are in compliance under FLSA. This is important because employers who wrongfully classify an employee as an independent contractor creates significant compliance risk, including failure to pay minimum wage and overtime.
Navigating Minimum Wage Increases
Margaret Oglesby, Compensation Consultant
compensation@cascadeemployers.com
In 2024, we will see 22 states and at least 30 cities and counties across the country increase minimum wage. As of January 1st, seven states, including Maryland, New Jersey, Washington D.C., Massachusetts, Connecticut, Washington, California, and most of New York have minimum wages of $15 or more. This is compared to just four states and Washington D.C. in 2023.
Washington state holds the title of highest state minimum wage starting at $16.28 (up from $15.74) and California comes in at a close second with a minimum wage increase from $15.50 to $16.00 an hour. Hawaii implemented the largest increase, raising their minimum wage $2.00 from $12.00 to $14.00. Other states such as Oregon, Nevada and Florida are scheduled to increase minimum wage throughout the year. There are also big sector-specific wage hikes forthcoming in some states. Starting in April, California’s fast-food employers must compensate their employees at least $20 an hour and on June 1st, health care workers will earn between $18.00 - $23.00 an hour, depending on the role, size and type of employer.
Understandably, organizations face challenges when mandated wage increases occur. Cost-effectiveness can become difficult, pay compression can impact pay equity, and employers with once higher starting wages can suddenly lose competitive edge. As employers attempt to remain both compliant and competitive, success will rely on creating or maintaining a strong compensation philosophy and strategy. The strategies below can assist with compensation management:
Organizational Design Review
Analyze the organization’s structure. This process often leads to revised or enhanced roles and aids in the identification of gaps or overlapping roles and creation of career paths. This may help identify operational efficiencies to better leverage your current workforce and offset some of the costs associated with mandated higher salaries.
Create or Update Job Descriptions
Job descriptions act as the cornerstone for employee performance and expectations in addition to justifying exemption status and compensation. By reanalyzing job duties and what is needed for the organization, you may be able to adjust your roles to help counteract minimum wage increases by restructuring roles.
Review or Establish a Salary Structure. Ensure Pay Equity
Review or establish a current compensation salary structure to ensure roles are competitive in the market and employees are compensated in an equitable fashion against their counterparts by conducting a pay equity analysis. Often minimum wage increases result in pay compression within the salary structure. It is important to see how these wage increases impact other relatable jobs and career hierarchies. Modeling out and analyzing how to integrate minimum wage increases to your full compensation structure is imperative. It is also important to look at these increases through a pay equity lens to see how these increases may impact other comparable roles.
Are you struggling with any of the aforementioned aspects? Cascade’s Compensation Team is ready to assist!
First Survey of 2024 - Q1 HR Trends Report Now Available!
McKenna Arnold, Survey and Research Manager
surveys@cascadeemployers.com
Cascade’s Q1 HR Trends Survey was conducted in January and ended with 51 participants. A big thank you to all organizations that participated!
This survey was the seventh in our now quarterly series, collecting data on key workplace issues related to compliance, recruitment and retention, compensation, DEI and leadership. Cascade uses this data to make sure our members have the resources they need to address how these trends may impact their workplace.
Here are some highlights:
- Recruiting and retaining talent has jumped to the top workplace challenge for organizations. This trend is mirrored in a later question, where there has been a 9% increase of organizations who are expecting a rise in their headcount compared to last quarter. Might be time to check out our Recruiting services led by our talented Trudy Hylemon, Senior HR and Leadership Consultant.
- Another workplace challenge, “Employee training and development,” has jumped up almost 20% from last quarter. Check out Cascade’s training services and see how we can help you.
- 63% of organizations identified “Coaching, Conflict and Accountability” as a priority in their planned 2024 learning opportunities. Check out our upcoming series on this topic here.
Additional questions in this survey include topics such as Total Rewards Statements and learning opportunities prioritized for organizations in 2024.
This report is free to members and can be found in the Members Only area of our website. Non-member participants also receive the report for free, and non-member non-participants can purchase the report here.
The next edition of this survey will be open for participation in April.
Payscale Peer Officially Replaces Cascade’s Regional Pay Survey
McKenna Arnold, Survey and Research Manager
surveys@cascadeemployers.com
Cascade is excited to have successfully launched our new compensation platform Payscale Peer last fall and, we are happy to announce our spring participation period is about to begin. If you’ve previously participated in Cascade’s Regional Pay survey, now is the time to register and submit your data for Payscale Peer as this replaces our Regional Pay Survey in 2024.
We believe this change will provide new compensation reporting options for our members (such as real-time data reports, online dashboarding, competitor comparisons, and national data sets), while still maintaining the great regional data that you know and appreciate.
With this information in mind, let’s dive into what is Payscale Peer, why the change, and what this means for our members.
What is Payscale and the Peer Platform?
Payscale is a compensation software and data company that helps employers manage employee compensation and remain competitive in their respective markets. One of their online tools is the Peer platform, which is an on-demand employer-reported market data source for organizations to enter their pay data and then compare to others, using a variety of filters and scopes on the data.
The Peer platform consists of data submitted for over 5,000 benchmark positions that span all industries, departments, and levels. This data is employer-reported and is reviewed and validated by data and compensation professionals both at Cascade and Payscale. The data set available in the platform is refreshed daily with the most recent eligible data so you can access the most recent compensation reports available.
Payscale Peer offers several unique compensation reporting tools that are of great value to employers. Aside from the daily data set updates, Payscale Peer offers unlimited data cuts, custom industry filters, competitor comparison (with anti-trust limitations), a national data set, and more. With all these features, Payscale’s Peer platform is set to be a great tool for organizations in their efforts to remain competitive in their compensation offerings.
Why change from Cascade’s annual Regional Pay Survey to Payscale Peer?
There are several reasons that Cascade decided to move survey platforms. Most pressing of these has been the past two years’ extreme fluctuations in salary ranges. From the impact of the “Great Resignation,” to recruitment/retention salary hikes, to inflation and changes in the economy, compensation data has become exceedingly volatile.
While our Regional Pay Survey provided data aging options, it was limited in its ability to reflect these frequent changes for organizations needing current trending data. With Payscale Peer, organizations will be able to see the most recent eligible data available, anytime they log in. This should help organizations stay on top of salary trends and remain competitive in the ever- shifting workplace environment.
There are additional benefits to the Payscale platform that we are excited to share. Examples include the ability to choose organizations to compare to by name (within limitations), online dashboarding, and the ability to narrow down compensation data by zip code. The Peer platform also contains compensation data from members of other Employer Associations across the country, so a national database is available for comparison. Finally, Payscale has the ability to link many HRIS systems, so organizations will not have to manually update their data after the first year. When linked, any changes you make in your HRIS will automatically update in Peer. All this and more is available in the platform. Join us in our upcoming Payscale Overview Webinar to learn more!
What does this change mean for Cascade’s members?
We began our transition into Payscale Peer with a fall participation window. Those participants have now been brought into the Payscale system, and we have opened our spring participation window. Participate before March 29th to be included in this second participation window!
The Regional Pay Survey has now sunsetted. For those interested in receiving regional and/or national compensation data, you will need to participate in Payscale Peer and purchase access to the site.
Previously, members had the option to participate in the Regional Pay Survey to get the reports for free. With the retirement of that survey, we will be transitioning to a new member benefit for surveys. Normally a $6,500 value, Cascade members will have a vastly reduced price to access unlimited job pricing from over 5,000 jobs, up‑to‑date data pulls, online dashboarding, and direct competitor comparisons. Pricing of Payscale is based on membership status and number of full-time employees (FTEs).
| Member | Non-Member | |
| 1-25 FTEs | $325 | $1,850 |
| 26-100 FTEs | $375 | $2,600 |
| 101+ FTEs | $425 | $3,300 |
All organizations that would like to access the Peer platform will need to participate – there is no non-participant option. However, organizations can still choose to participate in Peer without a fee. For those that wish to participate to improve the available data set for the individual job reports, no fee will be generated. Only those wishing to get access to the online Peer platform will result in the above fee. If you are interested in participating, you can register to participate here.
For organizations that only need limited compensation data, we do offer a free member benefit. Member organizations will be able to request two individual job reports per year at no charge. This new benefit is intended to continue providing free compensation data to organizations with few jobs or those who only need to price new jobs they are recruiting for.
Conclusion
We covered a lot of ground in the article above, and we are sure you have more questions. Cascade will provide additional information through emails and in our upcoming survey webinars, which can be found here. You can also check out our Payscale Peer website for more information. For those interested in participating, you can sign-up to participate here.
We hope you are as excited as us for this new way of collecting and reporting compensation data. Thank you for your continuing support of Cascade surveys!
Celebrating Your Success with Cascade: Gift Card Winners Announced!
Gayle Gilham, President
news@cascadeemployers.com
It brings us joy to look back and appreciate the shared successes and triumphs within our Cascade member community. Your collaboration and engagement have been the driving force behind the growth and impact we've achieved together.
Your Stories Help Steer Us Forward
In January, we invited Cascade members to share their experiences with us, and the response was heartwarming. Your stories of navigating the challenges of keeping up with ever-changing employment laws, one-on-one coaching to help your employees succeed, seeking guidance on intricate HR matters, and attending training to advance your HR and leadership skills, have not only inspired us but have also provided invaluable insights for your peers facing similar situations.
A special note of gratitude to each member who took the time to submit their Google Business reviews last month. Your willingness to share your Cascade experiences not only strengthens our Association community but also contributes to the growth and success of HR professionals who haven’t yet discovered the value of Cascade.
Inspiring Testimonials
We are thrilled to showcase sentiments of the two Cascade member gift card recipients that were randomly selected from those who graciously shared their experiences:
“Oregon Community Programs has been a member since fall 2019. I went through the fantastic HR Academy in 2020-2021. In the past four years, I have contacted them with many different topics and questions. Every single time without fail they are responsive, informative, and on the money. We retained them to do a compensation review which was a game changer. Between myself and others, we've taken nearly every training they've offered. We've commissioned particular group trainings for our managers and retained individual instructors for special coaching sessions. We participate in their annual Compliance Update. I feel completely comfortable saying I cannot imagine being without Cascade by our side.”
– Dana Singer
Oregon Community Programs (Eugene)
“The attorney is SOO helpful, she is quick and ready to help small businesses. Everyone at Cascade has been extremely helpful over all the years! We appreciate them!”
– Roz McKenna
McKenna Metal (Portland)
To see all Cascade reviews, or to leave a review of your own, visit this page.
Hot Compliance Question
Cascade Compliance Team
compliance@cascadeemployers.com
Question: Can you reduce an exempt employee’s salary during a partial-week business closure?
Answer: Generally, no. You may require an employee to use their employer-provided accrued leave (vacation, PTO, etc.). However, if an exempt employee has exhausted their accrued leave, they must still be paid their full salary for the week.
Five Things You May Not Know About Brothers Cleaning Service
By Sheryl Kelsh, Membership Development Manager
skelsh@cascadeemployers.com
Don't wait for Spring to kickstart your next cleaning project, especially when Brothers Cleaning Service is ready to be your partner in conquering tough cleaning tasks in the Eugene-Springfield, Salem, Albany, and Corvallis areas*.
Here are five things you may not know about this Oregon-based and family-owned cleaning company:
- Decades of Trust:
With roots dating back to 1973, Brothers Cleaning Service boasts over 50 years of experience in delivering top-notch commercial cleaning services, residential carpet cleaning, and exceptional customer service. Over 90% of their residential carpet cleaning business comes from satisfied repeat customers and referrals, a testament to the quality you can trust.
- Award-Winning Excellence:
Year after year, Brothers Cleaning Service earns accolades as the Best Carpet Cleaning Company and Commercial Cleaning Company. In 2023, Brothers won the Eugene Register Guard's annual Readers' Choice Awards in both categories and have been honored this consecutively since 2009.
- Wide Range of Services:
In addition to residential carpet cleaning, Brothers Cleaning Service offers a diverse range of commercial cleaning services—including janitorial services, carpet cleaning, floor stripping/waxing, window washing, parking lot cleaning, power washing, and post-construction cleanup. They position themselves as a comprehensive solution for all cleaning needs.
- Dedicated Employees:
Brothers works hard to take care of their employees so they take care of you. The company provides excellent benefits and growth opportunities, which allows it to recruit, hire and retain the best employees. Their longest-serving employees have been with the company 45 and 38 years! Brothers’ General Manager started as a cleaner 23 years ago and worked his way up through various positions in the company.
- Community-Focused Initiatives:
Brothers Cleaning Service goes beyond maintaining cleanliness; they actively engage in community initiatives. Supporting local charities and participating in community cleanup events, the company demonstrates a genuine commitment to the well-being of the neighborhoods it serves. Their community engagement sets them apart as more than just a service provider.
Brothers Cleaning Service is not just another cleaning company; it's a community-oriented, environmentally conscious, and technologically advanced service provider making them a trusted choice for those seeking an exceptional partner for your next cleaning project.
Cascade is pleased to have the opportunity to feature Brothers Cleaning Service as an outstanding member and employer.
* The commercial cleaning service area includes Eugene, Springfield, Corvallis, Salem OR and surrounding communities in Lane, Linn, Benton, Polk, and Marion counties.