HR4896-119

What This Bill Does

The Warehouse Worker Protection Act is a broad labor and workplace-safety bill for large covered warehouse employers. It establishes a Fairness and Transparency Office in the Department of Labor's Wage and Hour Division, headed by a presidentially appointed Director, with direct-hire authority and an advisory board including worker protection, civil rights, health and safety, workplace technology, disability law, labor, and worker advocacy representatives. Covered facilities include NAICS warehousing and storage, merchant wholesalers, electronic shopping and mail-order houses, and couriers and express delivery services. Covered employers include contractors, subcontractors, temporary service firms, staffing agencies, independent contractors, employee leasing entities, and similar entities that employ covered workers at covered facilities and have more than 200 covered-facility employees across affiliates. The bill defines quotas and employee work-speed data, then requires written quota descriptions, discipline explanations, termination notices, plain-language primary-language delivery, electronic access, contemporaneous records, worker rights to review and correct work-speed data, six-month data disclosures to current and former workers or representatives, posted notices, and limits on data collection and disclosure. It bars quotas that interfere with legally required breaks, health and safety requirements, bathroom use with travel time, reasonable accommodations, or nondiscrimination rights; bars adverse action based on undisclosed, unlawful, ranking-only, or continuous time-tallying quotas; and requires at least one paid 15-minute rest break for every four hours of work. It creates anti-retaliation protections with a 90-day rebuttable presumption, authorizes Wage and Hour inspections with worker or advocate representatives, requires investigations within 30 days for high-injury employers or complaint thresholds, coordinates DOL, OSHA, EEOC, NIOSH, EPA, NLRB, and state agencies, treats violations as FTC unfair or deceptive acts, adds NLRA protection against quotas that discourage section 7 rights with a 90-day retaliation presumption, requires NLRB quota reports, directs OSHA ergonomics and medical-referral standards, requires serious, willful, or repeated OSHA violations to be corrected during contests unless a stay is granted, preserves stronger state laws and collective bargaining terms, and authorizes sums necessary for fiscal years 2025 through 2035.

Who Benefits and How

Warehouse employees benefit from quota disclosures, work-speed data access, paid 15-minute rest breaks every four hours, bathroom and safety protections, and anti-retaliation rights. Temporary warehouse workers benefit because staffing agencies, subcontractors, employee leasing entities, and similar entities are included in covered employer rules. Labor organizations benefit from worker-designated inspection participation, NLRA quota protections, and stronger retaliation presumptions. Worker advocacy organizations benefit from inspection participation, complaint referrals, and advisory-board representation. Workers with disabilities benefit because quotas cannot interfere with reasonable accommodations or nondiscrimination rights. Occupational health researchers benefit from required ergonomics, medical-referral, injury, and quota enforcement reports.

Who Bears the Burden and How

Large warehouse employers must disclose quotas, limit work-speed data practices, provide breaks, maintain records, answer data requests, avoid unlawful adverse actions, and comply with inspections. E-commerce fulfillment operators face compliance costs because electronic shopping and mail-order warehouse facilities are expressly covered. Courier and express delivery warehouse operators face the same quota, data, rest-break, and inspection rules. Temporary staffing firms must comply when they employ covered workers at covered facilities. The Department of Labor must create the Fairness and Transparency Office, issue rules, conduct inspections, coordinate complaints, and enforce worker protections. OSHA must issue ergonomics and medical-referral standards and administer new abatement-stay procedures. The FTC must enforce section 102 violations as unfair or deceptive acts or practices. The NLRB must enforce and report on quota-related interference with section 7 rights.

Key Provisions

• Establishes a Department of Labor Fairness and Transparency Office and advisory board.
• Requires written quota descriptions, adverse-action explanations, termination notices, worker data access, records, posted notices, and primary-language communications.
• Prohibits quotas that interfere with breaks, health and safety, bathroom access, reasonable accommodations, nondiscrimination rights, or NLRA rights.
• Requires at least one paid 15-minute rest break for every four hours of covered warehouse work.
• Creates anti-retaliation rules with a 90-day rebuttable presumption.
• Authorizes DOL inspections with worker representatives, complaint-triggered investigations, FTC enforcement, NLRB reports, OSHA ergonomics and medical-referral standards, and faster abatement of serious violations.
• Preserves stronger state laws and collective bargaining terms and authorizes appropriations for fiscal years 2025 through 2035.