Assembly Bill 2296 brings California another step closer to a fully paperless system. Partners David Harris and Yvette Davis authored an article “AB 2296: Electronic signatures” in Daily Journal’s New Laws 2017 report, discussing the impact of the passage of AB 2296.
As written in their article, Assembly Bill 2296 “has the incidental and perhaps unintended consequence of relaxing another hurdle employees have to overcome before they can sue their employers for FEHA violations. Employees simply need to ‘fill in the box’ on an electronic form and hit ‘send’ on the computer to receive a right-to-sue letter.”
California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA) requires plaintiffs to exhaust their administrative remedies with either the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) or the Department of Fair Employment and Housing (DFEH) by filing a complaint and obtaining a right-to-sue notice from the DFEH before filing a lawsuit alleging FEHA violations.
The original statute required an actual signature for a complaint to be filed, and while the use of electronic signatures are permitted by case law, it wasn’t codified within the applicable government code until California’s Legislature passed AB 2296.