Disability compensation: voluntary plans.

Existing law authorizes an employer, a majority of the employees employed in this state of an employer, or both, to apply to the Director of Employment Development for approval of a voluntary plan for the payment of disability benefits to the employees electing to be in a voluntary plan. Existing law, until January 1, 2015, authorizes the Director of Employment Development to approve a single voluntary plan for all of the small-business-third-party administrator's clients and their employees if specified criteria are met. This bill would extend the operation of these provisions indefinitely. This bill would require the small-business-third-party administrator use separate accounting ledgers, rather than individual subaccounts, for each client's contributions and plan assets. The bill would make the small-business-third-party administrator, rather than the employer, responsible for providing the financial security requirements for the plan. The bill would also authorize the Director of Employment Development to terminate a plan for cause and to recover plan assets from the small-business-third-party administrator, as specified. This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as an urgency statute.