Seasonal Employees and Temporary Workers: What to Get Right This Holiday Season

For many businesses, the last few months of the year bring a surge in demand, and extra help becomes essential. Seasonal and temporary workers can make the busiest weeks manageable. They can also create problems when a business assumes that short-term employment comes with simpler rules.

In California, seasonal employees are generally covered by the same employment rules as anyone else on the team, and many of those rules apply from the first day. Getting a few key areas right before the season starts can save a lot of trouble in January.

This article offers general information for California employers. It isn't legal advice, and specific situations are worth reviewing with an HR professional or employment attorney.

Classifying seasonal employees correctly

A job being temporary doesn't make the worker an independent contractor. Under California's ABC test, a person providing labor or services is considered an employee unless the business can show all three of the following: the worker is free from the business's control and direction, the work is outside the usual course of the business, and the worker is customarily engaged in an independently established trade or business of the same kind.

The second condition is often the deciding factor for seasonal help. Someone hired to staff a sales floor or pack orders is usually doing the regular work of the business, which makes contractor status difficult to support.

Businesses that bring in help through a staffing agency have their own considerations. Under California law, when a business uses agency-supplied workers for work within its usual course of business, it shares legal responsibility with the agency for paying those workers' wages and for workers' compensation coverage, and it can't shift its workplace safety obligations to the agency.

This rule applies to businesses with 25 or more workers in total, including agency-supplied workers, when more than five workers are supplied by a labor contractor at a given time. It's worth confirming that any agency you work with handles payroll and coverage correctly.

Onboarding on a faster timeline

Seasonal employees need the same basic onboarding as permanent hires, often compressed into a much shorter window.

• Employment eligibility. Federal Form I-9 still applies. The employer must complete Section 2 within three business days of the employee's first day of work for pay. If the job will last fewer than three days, it must be completed by the first day.

  
  

• Pay rates. California's minimum wage is $16.90 per hour as of January 1, 2026. Fast food and healthcare employers have higher statewide rates, and some cities and counties set higher local rates. Seasonal roles that extend past the new year should also account for the next increase: the state minimum wage rises to $17.40 per hour on January 1, 2027.

  
  

• A short orientation. Even a brief welcome makes a difference. It helps to cover who to go to with questions and how scheduling works, along with any safety basics for the role.

  
  

Scheduling during the busiest weeks

Demand during the holidays can be hard to predict, which makes scheduling rules especially relevant.

Under California's reporting time pay rule, when an employee reports for a scheduled shift but is given no work or less than half of it, they generally must be paid for half the scheduled shift, with a minimum of two hours and a maximum of four hours, at their regular rate. There are some exceptions.

In practice, sending a seasonal employee home early on a slow day can still carry a cost.

Building schedules around realistic demand, and communicating changes as early as possible, helps keep those costs predictable.

Paid sick leave applies to seasonal employees too

California's paid sick leave law covers employees who work for the same employer for at least 30 days within a year, and employees must complete a 90-day employment period before using it.

Employers can either provide the leave up front or have employees earn it, at a rate of at least one hour for every 30 hours worked.

Many holiday hires will leave before reaching day 90, but their sick leave still needs to be tracked. That matters if you rehire returning seasonal workers. When an employee is rehired within one year of separation, previously accrued and unused paid sick days must generally be reinstated, unless that time was paid out when employment ended.

When the season ends

The end of a seasonal job has timing rules of its own.

In California, wages earned and unpaid at the time of discharge are due immediately, and the California Supreme Court has held that this includes releasing an employee after completing the specific job assignment or time period they were hired for. Final pay must also include any accrued, unused vacation.

A narrow exception gives employers up to 72 hours when laying off a group of seasonal employees who worked in curing, canning, or drying perishable fruit, fish, or vegetables.

For most businesses, that means a seasonal employee's final paycheck is generally due on their last day. Planning each final paycheck ahead of time, especially when several assignments end in the same week, keeps the season from ending with a compliance problem.

The end of the season is also a good moment to look ahead. A brief conversation with standout seasonal employees about returning next year, or about permanent openings, can make next season's hiring much easier.

A few questions worth asking

• Is everyone helping out this season classified correctly, whether hired directly or through an agency?

• Does your scheduling approach account for reporting time pay on slower days?

• Are final paychecks for seasonal employees planned before their last day?

• Which of this year's seasonal hires would you want back next year?

Seasonal help is often what gets a business through its busiest stretch.

Treating those roles with the same care as permanent ones protects the business, and it makes the business a place people want to return to.

If you'd like support preparing for seasonal hiring, MCDA CCG's HR team works with growing businesses on the practical side of hiring and compliance.