Richey

An employer terminated an employee who was absent on approved medical leave, but engaged in outside employment in violation of company policy. After an 11-day arbitration hearing, the arbitrator relied on the federal “honest belief’ defense and rejected the employee’s claim that the employer violated the employee’s right to reinstatement under the Moore-Brown-Roberti Family Rights Act (CFRA) (Gov. Code, §§ 12945.1, 12945.2) and its federal counterpart, the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 (FMLA) ( 29 U.S.C. §§ 2601-2654 ). The trial court confirmed the arbitrator’s award, but the Court of Appeal vacated the award in the employer’s favor.

We granted review to determine whether, in the absence of an express agreement between the parties, courts may review and vacate (or correct) an arbitration award involving both an employee’s unwaivable statutory rights and an employer’s written policy forbidding outside employment while on leave. We conclude that although the arbitrator may have committed error in adopting a defense untested in our court, any error that may have occurred did not deprive the employee of an unwaivable statutory right because the arbitrator found he…