By Isett                                              H.B. No. 3436
         76R5481 JMM-D                           
                                A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
 1-1                                   AN ACT
 1-2     relating to the liability of certain employers for chargebacks
 1-3     under the unemployment compensation system.
 1-4           BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
 1-5           SECTION 1.  Section 204.021, Labor Code, is amended to read
 1-6     as follows:
 1-7           Sec. 204.021.  CHARGEBACKS.  (a)  The amount of benefits paid
 1-8     to a claimant for a benefit year shall be charged to the account
 1-9     [accounts] of each employer of the claimant for whom [of] the
1-10     claimant worked [claimant's employers] during the claimant's base
1-11     period.  The chargebacks of an employer for a calendar quarter are
1-12     the benefits paid to all of the  employer's employees or former
1-13     employees during that quarter.
1-14           (b)  Except as provided by Subsection (c), the [The]
1-15     chargeback of benefits of a claimant who has two or more employers
1-16     during the claimant's base period is allocated among those
1-17     employers according to the proportion of the total of the
1-18     claimant's benefit wage credits paid during the base period by each
1-19     employer.
1-20           (c)  Benefits may not be charged to the account of an
1-21     employer under Subsection (b) for a claimant who remains in that
1-22     employer's employment.
1-23           SECTION 2.  This Act takes effect September 1, 1999, and
1-24     applies only to the liability of an employer for a claim for
 2-1     unemployment compensation benefits that is filed with the Texas
 2-2     Workforce Commission on or after that date. A claim filed before
 2-3     the effective date of this Act is governed by the law in effect on
 2-4     the date the claim was filed, and the former law is continued in
 2-5     effect for that purpose.
 2-6           SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the
 2-7     crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
 2-8     emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
 2-9     constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
2-10     days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended.