As an employer, you expect your employees to be sober when working. They should not be intoxicated when reporting or returning to work after lunch or a rest period. Thus, to maintain professionalism, improve employee morale and productivity, reduce absenteeism and avoid accidents, you may require them to submit to drug and alcohol testing.
However, while such testing may be allowed in California, you should be cautious. Here is what you should know:
Pre-employment testing
After making a job offer to a qualified candidate, you can require a “suspicionless” drug test as a condition of employment. With this testing, you don’t need observable facts to reasonably suspect intoxication.
While California allows pre-employment drug and alcohol testing, the laws surrounding marijuana/cannabis are complicated. Firstly, the state prohibits employers from discriminating against applicants and employees for their off-duty, off-site cannabis use. Additionally, you cannot use traditional drug tests to test for cannabis use – the tests you use must be valid for only identifying psychoactive compounds in cannabis.
After employment testing
After employment, the laws regarding drug and alcohol testing become even more limiting. For starters, you can’t require random drug and alcohol testing. You need to provide employees with a notice. However, you may require employees to take a routine test in circumstances defined by the state. Always obtain more information to know if a situation constitutes such circumstances.
Further, if you have specific objective facts that show an employee is impaired, you may have grounds to require that employee to submit to a drug or alcohol testing. Lastly, you can test employees for drugs or alcohol after a serious accident.
It’s critical to be well-informed about requiring applicants and employees to submit to drug and alcohol tests. Legal guidance can help you do everything by the book.