Sean Hoolehan, CGCS said: Mel,
I think they need to recognize seasonal work rather than just "Variable Hour Work". This make us limit summer hires to under 30 hours a week. This category of employee includes teachers, students, seniors, and all sorts of people who we find looking for seasonal work who are not looking for healthcare insurance.
I agree there could be more flexibility in the definitions, but I'm sure they avoid it as some employer will take advantage of the employees.
Isn't there something in the rules that employers have to offer, but the employee doesn't have to take health care from the employer? Is there still a cost to the employer for those plans if the employee doesn't take it? I think the thought was, the employer pays a portion and the employee pays a portion, but if the employee could stay on their spouses plan, has other options like Medicare or Tricare, or find cheaper insurance on the exchange then the employer is off the hook, so could that address those people looking for seasonal or part time work?
The city here has finalized their rules, if someone works year around or outside of April-Sept. (March - August for the airport), they must stay under 28 hours per week. They even want us to schedule them for 25 just to be safe. These people would be classified as part-time. We can hire seasonal workers from April 1st to September 30th and work them however many hours we need them, so they can work 40+ hours per week if that is what we need.
On the golf course that should work pretty well for us, October depending on the weather can be a little rough. The areas so far that I've heard that it is affecting is ball fields as they start hosting tournaments in March and also October. I think the SPARC programs (parks in schools that provide activities that doubles as before and after school child care might be suffering a little too, but they hopefully can find college students (which we have plenty) that are looking at those flexible hours.
Mel