San Francisco Fair Chance Hiring Changes: Four Conviction Categories and 14-Day Acknowledgment

When a San Francisco screen returns a conviction, the first question is whether it is one of the four out-of-state conviction categories that are off-limits in hiring decisions. The second question is whether your file can show the candidate got a real chance to answer. The amended ordinance took effect on August 10, 2026, after Mayor Daniel Lurie of San Francisco signed it on July 10, 2026.

The amendment changes what a screen may feed into a decision

When a vendor still pulls every conviction from a report, the legal question is no longer whether the report contains them. It is whether your team can show that they were excluded before anyone made a decision.

For a manager, the practical fix is to treat those categories as unavailable information. Interview questions stay away from them. Hiring panels stay clear of them. When a report includes one, note the exclusion in the file and move to the rest of the assessment. That note is short, dated, and visible to the next person who opens the file.

The practical requirement is a defensible record that the decision did not rest on those categories. A separate room for them is not required. In a small company, that often means a brief entry in the hiring file: the category was identified, the category was excluded, and the remaining information was considered. In a larger company, it means the vendor workflow and the manager instructions both say the same thing.

Keep the exclusion language neutral. Do not describe the category in the interview notes. The candidate's explanation of the category does not become a separate assessment. Should the candidate raise it, answer that the category is outside the decision and the file will reflect only the permitted information.

The notice sequence now has a receipt step

The conviction-based adverse-action process has a fixed order. The steps below are the ones to keep in your file.

• Remove the four out-of-state conviction categories from consideration: Abortion-Related Healthcare Conviction, Drag Conviction, Gender Affirming Care Conviction, and Spontaneous Abortion-Related Conviction.
• Run an individualized assessment before any adverse decision based on a conviction.
• Deliver the report to the candidate before adverse action.
• Send a pre-adverse action letter and allow seven days for a response.
• If the candidate responds within seven days, acknowledge receipt within 14 days and reconsider.
• Send a final adverse action letter within 30 days of the response, or within 30 days of the pre-adverse letter if no response.
• Track penalty exposure: $1,000 per person for a first violation, up to $4,000 for subsequent violations, and $1,000 per person per day in civil liquidated damages.

Operationally, the acknowledgment step is the one that tends to slip. A candidate may answer by email, by phone, or through a portal. Your team should record the date the answer arrived, the date the confirmation went out, and the person who made the review decision. Late answers change the sequence, but the file should still show why the later path was used. A calendar reminder is not enough if the reminder is not tied to the file.

Penalties make timing a compliance issue

A missed receipt step can become the basis for a penalty claim. The vendor may prepare the report, but the employer still owns the sequence. Put the dates in the case file, not in a general policy paragraph.

Good practice goes further than the minimum. Train the people who run screens to stop when a report contains a barred category. Give them a simple script for redirecting a conversation. Keep the script short enough that a manager will actually use it. Make the hiring manager responsible for the file, not just the decision. The rule sets the minimum. Your internal process is what keeps the file defensible when a candidate asks for it.