When your mother was approved for In-Home Supportive Services and you signed up to be her provider, California created an employment relationship and put her on the employer side of it. Not the county. Not the state. Her.
Here is the structure underneath all of it, and what each piece actually controls.
A note on “your mother”
This piece follows one common situation — an adult child providing IHSS to a parent — because a specific example is easier to follow than a generic one. Read father, husband, wife, grandmother, son, daughter, or simply the person I care for wherever it says “mother.” The structure does not change: the recipient is the employer, the provider is the employee, the county authorizes the hours, and the state issues the check.
Two things do change with the relationship, and both are flagged where they come up:
- Unemployment and state disability coverage turn on who works for whom. That section is not interchangeable — read it as written.
- Parents providing care to their own child under 18 face extra eligibility rules that this article does not cover.
Five parties, one job
Most explanations of IHSS name three players. There are five, and the two people usually left out are the ones who set your pay and cut your check.
- 1Your motherThe employer. Hires, supervises, schedules, approves timesheets, and fires.Cannot change your wage or add hours.
- 2YouThe employee. Enrolled, background-checked, and designated by her.Not a county or state worker.
- 3The countyAssesses eligibility, authorizes hours, runs enrollment, issues violations.Does not employ you and does not pay you.
- 4The stateCDSS performs her payroll duties; the State Controller issues the payment.Not a joint employer.
- 5The public authorityEmployer of record for collective bargaining only. Your wage lives in that contract.Not liable for what you do on the job.
1. Your mother — the employer
The statute is direct. Welfare and Institutions Code section 12301.6(c)(1): “Recipients shall retain the right to hire, fire, and supervise the work of any in-home supportive services personnel providing services to them.”
When she designated you as her provider, she signed a SOC 426A, which states: “Neither the county nor the State will be held responsible for any claims and/or losses caused by the above-named person I choose to hire as my IHSS provider.”
That is employer language. She chose you, and she holds the relationship.
2. You — the employee
CDSS’s provider benefits notice (PUB 104) says it in one sentence: “your employer is the IHSS recipient that hired you, not the State of California, County of San Diego, or IHSS Public Authority.” That wording is from the San Diego Public Authority’s December 2021 copy; CDSS’s own posted version carries a 12/06 date and says the same thing.
PUB 104 is old. Its employer statement is still accurate and still distributed by county public authorities, but its timesheet instructions describe mailing paper forms and are obsolete.
Use it for the employment relationship, not for procedure.
3. The county — eligibility, hours, and the power to stop you
The county social worker assesses your mother, authorizes a monthly number of service hours, and issues the Notice of Action. The county also runs your side: provider orientation, the Department of Justice criminal background check, and the enrollment paperwork. And the county issues the violations that can suspend you.
What the county does not do is employ you or pay you.
4. The state — your actual payroll department
The county is not your payroll agent, and describing it that way is a common error. Under WIC 12302.2, CDSS is required to “perform or ensure the performance of all rights, duties, and obligations of the recipient” for payroll and unemployment purposes, and the State Controller “shall make any deductions from the wages of in-home supportive services personnel.”
Your paycheck is a state payment issued on your mother’s behalf. When you call the county about a missing check, you are calling the office that can look it up — not the office that cut it.
The courts have said the same thing. In Yalung v. State (2023), the Court of Appeal held the state is not a joint employer of IHSS providers; it performs administrative and payroll duties on the recipient’s behalf and does not control the provider’s day-to-day work.
5. The public authority — employer of record, for one purpose only
Every county has a public authority or nonprofit consortium. Section 12301.6(c)(2)(A) deems it the employer of IHSS personnel “for the purposes of collective bargaining over wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of employment.”
That is the entire scope. Your wage comes out of a contract negotiated between the public authority and a union, which is why your mother cannot give you a raise and cannot negotiate your rate — and why your pay changes when a contract does, not when your workload does.
The public authority also cannot be sued for what you do. Section 12301.6(f)(1) deems it “not to be the employer … for purposes of liability due to the negligence or intentional torts of the in-home supportive services personnel.”
Who actually does what
| Decision | Who actually decides |
|---|---|
| Whether you are hired | Your mother. WIC 12301.6(c)(1). |
| What tasks you do, and when | Your mother, within the services the county authorized. |
| Whether you are fired | Your mother, at will. No cause or notice required. |
| How many hours are authorized | The county social worker’s assessment, issued as a Notice of Action. |
| Your hourly rate | The union contract with the county public authority, above the state minimum wage. |
| Whether your timesheet is approved | Your mother, in the Electronic Services Portal. |
| Who issues the payment | The State Controller’s Office, on your mother’s behalf. |
| Whether you may work as a provider at all | The county and state: background check, enrollment, and violations. |
| Who is liable if you are negligent | Not the county, the state, or the public authority. |
Why the authorization letter is not a job offer
The Notice of Action your mother receives is a benefit determination. It tells her how many hours of which services the program will pay for. It is addressed to her, it decides her eligibility, and it hires nobody.
You are not a provider until you have separately:
- Complete and sign the Provider Enrollment FormSOC 426. This is your application, not hers.SOC 426
- Get fingerprinted and clear the background checkCalifornia Department of Justice criminal background check.LIVE SCAN
- Attend your county’s provider orientationScheduled by the county or the public authority.COUNTY
- Sign the Provider Enrollment AgreementSOC 846. Covers timesheets, overtime, workweek caps, and violations.SOC 846
- Have your mother designate youSOC 426A, signed by her. Without it, you are enrolled but not hired.SOC 426A
Care you provide before enrollment is complete generally is not payable. CDSS’s enrollment instructions (SOC 847) tell prospective providers to complete all the listed steps “before you can be enrolled as a provider and receive payment.”
If you started helping the day the letter arrived, those weeks are usually unpaid. Ask your county in writing before assuming otherwise — do not rely on a verbal assurance.
If the hours are wrong, your mother has 90 days from the date she receives the Notice of Action to request a state hearing. To keep her current hours while the appeal is pending — aid paid pending — she has to file before the effective date of the change, which is usually a much shorter window than 90 days. It is her appeal. You can testify at it; you cannot file it.
- 90 days
- To request a state hearing, counted from the date she receives the Notice of Action.
- Before the change takes effect
- To keep her current hours while the appeal is pending — “aid paid pending.” Usually a much shorter window than 90 days.
It is her appeal, not yours. You can testify at the hearing; you cannot file it.
Why a rejected timesheet has no appeal
In the Electronic Services Portal, you submit the timesheet and your mother approves or rejects it. If you are not a live-in provider, you also check in and check out and indicate whether services were provided in the home or in the community. You are paid on the hours you report as worked, not on the span between check-in and check-out. Live-in providers who have filed a SOC 2298 are exempt from the location check-in and check-out requirement.
Here is the part nobody explains: if your mother rejects your timesheet, there is no state hearing for that. State hearings exist for her service decisions — hours, eligibility, termination of services. They are not a wage claim process for providers.
CDSS does not publish a statewide appeal path for a provider whose recipient will not approve a timesheet. State hearings exist for the recipient’s service decisions, not for provider pay.
- Call your county IHSS office and the public authority. Counties resolve these informally, and informally is all there is.
- Put the schedule in writing first. CDSS publishes a voluntary Consumer and Provider Job Agreement for exactly this.
- Keep your own dated record of hours worked, separate from the portal.
The practical defense is to be boring about it in advance. CDSS publishes an IHSS Consumer and Provider Job Agreement: a written record of duties, schedule, hours per week, and rate, with a signature line that reads “Consumer/Employer.” It is voluntary, and it does not override program rules. But a signed schedule is exactly what you will wish you had the first time a week is disputed.
Firing, quitting, and the county's separate veto
Your mother can fire you. She does not need cause, she does not need to give notice, and there is no statewide termination form.
This is the widest gap between statute and practice in the program. Section 12301.6(c)(1) grants the right to fire but supplies no procedure for exercising it, so counties fill the gap with their own paperwork and phone scripts.
That is why the answer to “how do I remove my provider?” is different in Fresno than in Los Angeles. Call your county IHSS office and ask what they require. Do not assume a form exists, and do not assume one does not.
Operationally, two things have to happen: the county has to find out, so you stop being the person whose timesheets are expected, and the next provider has to go through the full enrollment sequence and get their own SOC 426A.
The county can also end your ability to work regardless of what your mother wants. Exceed the workweek or travel-time limits and you accumulate violations:
- 1st violationWritten warningThe county sends notice and explains the rules.
- 2nd violation14 days to erase itOne chance to complete instructional materials and sign a certification.
- 3rd violation90-day suspensionYour eligibility to work as a provider is suspended.
- 4th violationOne year outThen re-enroll from scratch — SOC 426, background check, orientation, SOC 846.
Your review rights: 10 calendar days to ask the county to review a violation. For a third or fourth violation you may also request state-level review through the Provider Appeals Unit — and you can keep working while a review is pending.
The limits themselves: overtime starts after 40 hours in a workweek; if you work for more than one recipient, your combined cap is 66 hours a week; travel time is capped at 7 hours a week.
What being an employee actually gets you
Paid sick leave
For State Fiscal Year 2026/2027, 40 hours, beginning July 1, 2026. You must work 100 hours providing authorized services before the hours are available, then work another 200 hours or 60 calendar days before you can use them. Unused hours expire on June 30. Nothing carries over.
Overtime and workers’ compensation
Overtime above 40 hours in a workweek, and workers’ compensation coverage if you are injured on the job. Providers are treated as employees for both of these even though the state is not your employer.
The live-in tax exclusion
If you live in the same home as your mother, filing a SOC 2298 excludes your IHSS wages from federal and state income tax under IRS Notice 2014-7. CDSS is explicit about the limit: “The SOC 2298 only applies to Federal and State wages, it doesn’t apply to FICA and Medicare.” Social Security and Medicare still come out of your check. If you move out, a SOC 2299 cancels the certification.
Unemployment insurance — read this part twice
The widely repeated claim that “family providers can’t collect unemployment” is only true for some family relationships — and an adult child working for a parent is probably not one of them.
Unemployment Insurance Code section 631 excludes “service performed by a child under the age of 18 years in the employ of his father or mother, or service performed by an individual in the employ of his son, daughter, or spouse.”
Read the second half slowly. The exclusion covers people working for their son, daughter, or spouse. An adult child working for a parent is not on that list. CDSS’s provider benefits notice matches the statute: unemployment benefits may be available if you are able and available to work, are not the parent or spouse of your recipient, and meet the other eligibility rules.
In Skidgel v. California Unemployment Insurance Appeals Board (2021), the California Supreme Court held that IHSS providers in the relationships listed in section 631 are not eligible for unemployment. The provider in that case was a mother caring for her adult daughter — she was working for her daughter, squarely inside the exclusion. If you are an adult child caring for your mother, you are on the other side of that line.
Same program, opposite answer
- You care for your motherLIKELY COVERED An adult child working for a parent is not among the relationships section 631 excludes. Unemployment may be available if you meet the ordinary eligibility rules.Unemp. Ins. Code § 631; CDSS PUB 104
- A parent cares for an adult childEXCLUDED Section 631 excludes service performed for your son, daughter, or spouse. The California Supreme Court confirmed it in Skidgel (2021).Unemp. Ins. Code § 631; Skidgel v. CUIAB (2021)
This cuts the opposite way for parents providing IHSS to an adult disabled child. They are inside the exclusion, and Skidgel is the case that settled it.
Same program, same family, opposite answer — depending on which direction the care runs.
State disability insurance
SDI is deducted from provider paychecks, and family-relationship exclusions apply here too — but the published guidance is not consistent about which relationships. CDSS’s PUB 104 describes elective SDI for a “parent, spouse or child” of the recipient. Section 631’s exclusion for a child is limited to a child under 18. At least one county public authority describes it as “spouse, parent, or minor child.” Ask your county payroll unit which category your paycheck is coded under, and check your paystub for the SDI line.
The statute governs where it conflicts with agency guidance, but your paycheck is coded by whoever set it up.
If your relationship falls in the gap between PUB 104’s wording and section 631’s, get the answer in writing from the county before you count on either disability coverage or an exemption.
The five-minute version
- Your mother is your employer. The county is not, and the state is not.
- The county decides how many hours are authorized. Your mother decides what you do with them.
- Your paycheck comes from the State Controller’s Office, issued on your mother’s behalf.
- Your wage is set by a union contract with the county public authority. Nobody in your house can change it.
- Two enrollments have to happen: yours (SOC 426, background check, orientation, SOC 846) and her designation of you (SOC 426A).
- A rejected timesheet is an employment dispute with your mother, not an appealable county decision.
- A wrong hours decision is her appeal — 90 days to file, and before the effective date if she wants to keep current hours during it.
- The county can suspend you through violations even if she wants you working.
- If you are an adult child working for your parent, you are probably not in the unemployment exclusion. Check section 631 before anyone tells you otherwise.
Where to take the questions this raises
Different problems belong to different offices. Sending the question to the wrong one is the most common reason people wait weeks for an answer.
- Your county IHSS officeAuthorized hours, the Notice of Action, provider enrollment, violations, and terminating a provider.
- Your county public authorityWage rate and the union contract, orientation, provider registry, and benefits questions.
- IHSS Service Desk — (866) 376-7066Electronic Services Portal, electronic timesheets, EVV check-in and check-out, and direct deposit.
Sources
CDSS is the primary authority throughout. Where county guidance and the statute differ, the statute governs.
- Cal. Welf. & Inst. Code § 12301.6 (2025 code, via Justia) Recipient's right to hire, fire, and supervise; public authority deemed employer for collective bargaining only; public authority deemed not the employer for liability.
- Cal. Welf. & Inst. Code § 12302.2 (2025 code, via Justia) CDSS performs the recipient's employer duties for payroll and unemployment purposes; the State Controller makes the wage deductions.
- Cal. Unemployment Insurance Code § 631 (2025 code, via Justia) The exact family relationships excluded from “employment” for unemployment insurance: a child under 18 working for a parent, and anyone working for their son, daughter, or spouse.
- Skidgel v. California Unemployment Insurance Appeals Board (Cal. Supreme Court, No. S250149, Aug. 19, 2021) Holding that IHSS providers in the relationships listed in section 631 are not eligible for unemployment benefits; the provider there was a mother working for her adult daughter.
- Yalung v. State (Cal. Ct. App., 5th Dist., No. F084367, 2023) The State is not a joint employer of IHSS providers; it performs administrative and payroll duties on the recipient's behalf.
- SOC 426A — IHSS Program Recipient Designation of Provider (CDSS) The recipient's designation form and its “person I choose to hire” language disclaiming county and State responsibility.
- SOC 846 — IHSS Program Provider Enrollment Agreement (CDSS) Timesheet certification, the 40-hour overtime threshold, the 66-hour combined weekly cap across recipients, and the violation system.
- SOC 847 — Important Information for Prospective Providers About the IHSS Provider Enrollment Process (CDSS) The four-step enrollment sequence (SOC 426, background check, orientation, SOC 846) and the requirement to complete it before being enrolled and paid.
- CDSS PUB 104 — IHSS Individual Provider Benefits and Services Information “Your employer is the IHSS recipient that hired you”; the unemployment and State Disability Insurance family exclusions. CDSS's posted copy is dated 12/06.
- San Diego IHSS Public Authority — PUB 104 provider benefits notice (December 2021 file) The current county-distributed version of the same notice, used here to confirm the employer statement and unemployment language are still in circulation.
- CDSS All County Letter 16-36 — Violations for Exceeding Workweek and Travel Time Limits The four-violation ladder, the 14-day rescission window on a second violation, the 90-day and one-year suspensions, and the 10-day review deadlines.
- CDSS — Electronic Services (Electronic Services Portal) Providers submit electronic timesheets; recipients approve or reject them online.
- CDSS — Electronic Visit Verification (EVV) Help Non-live-in check-in/check-out and home-or-community reporting, the live-in exemption via SOC 2298, and payment based on hours worked rather than the check-in to check-out span.
- CDSS — Live-In Provider Self-Certification Information SOC 2298 and SOC 2299, IRS Notice 2014-7, and the statement that the exclusion does not apply to FICA and Medicare.
- CDSS — Paid Sick Leave Program Information 40 paid sick leave hours for State Fiscal Year 2026/2027 beginning July 1, 2026; the 100-hour accrual threshold, the 200-hour or 60-day waiting period, and June 30 expiration.
- CDSS — IHSS Consumer and Provider Job Agreement (fact sheet) The voluntary written agreement covering duties, schedule, weekly hours, and rate, signed by the “Consumer/Employer.”
- Disability Rights California — IHSS Fair Hearings Guide The 90-day deadline to request a state hearing and the requirement to appeal before the effective date to receive aid paid pending.
- Legislative Analyst's Office — IHSS Timesheet Processing (November 1, 2016) The State Controller's Office issues provider paychecks; counties handle exceptions and mediate disputes over hours. Dated 2016 and pre-dates the current electronic timesheet system.
- Fresno County — Recipients As Employers County guidance on the recipient's scheduling and supervision duties and on the county's role in issuing violations. Cited as county guidance, not statute.
