Washington Voids Noncompetes June 30, 2027. Repay-If-You-Leave Clauses Count

Washington's ban on noncompetes takes effect June 30, 2027. ESHB 1155 (Chapter 149, Laws of 2026), signed March 23, makes "all noncompetition covenants ... void and unenforceable ... regardless of when the parties entered into" them. L&I's September 30 release confirmed the date and set the last interim salary threshold: from January to June 2027, a noncompete can be enforced only against an employee earning more than $131,326.59.

Why it matters below that salary line too

For a BCBA earning less than $131,326.59, current law already makes a classic noncompete unenforceable. The bill does more than drop the threshold, though. It widens what counts as a noncompete, and two of the new categories, repayment and patients who follow, reach clauses a practice may have in its own contracts.

• Repayment and forfeiture: a noncompete now "includes any provision in an agreement that threatens, demands, requires, or otherwise effectuates that an individual return, repay, or forfeit any right, benefit, or compensation" because they go to work elsewhere.
• The one carve-out: a written agreement to repay "out-of-pocket educational expenses" survives only if it "Expires within 18 months of the employee's start date," is limited to "the pro rata portion of the remaining time," and releases the employee who leaves for "good cause." Whether employer-provided fieldwork supervision counts as an out-of-pocket educational expense, the statute doesn't say.
• Patients who follow: "An agreement that directly or indirectly prohibits the acceptance or transaction of business with a customer, patient, or client is not a 'nonsolicitation agreement.'" A ban on actively soliciting families can still stand, for up to 18 months and only for families the clinician worked with. A ban on accepting a family who chooses to follow is a noncompete, and void.
• Selling the practice: sale-of-business covenants survive only for someone selling or buying "one percent or more."

Dates and who they bind

• June 30, 2027: every covenant is void. Enforcing one, threatening to, telling an employee they're bound by one, or asking someone to sign one is itself a violation.
• October 1, 2027: employers must make "reasonable efforts to provide written notice to all current and former employees and independent contractors" still inside a covenant's term that it's void.
• Penalty: actual damages or "a statutory penalty of five thousand dollars," whichever is greater, plus attorneys' fees. The attorney general can also sue.

The limits

Confidentiality and trade-secret clauses are untouched. Contractors are covered as well as employees. The law has no rule yet on how "reasonable efforts" at notice will be judged.

What you must know or do

• Owners: pull your current offer letter, BCBA employment agreement and any supervision or training agreement. Mark every clause that makes someone repay, forfeit or lose pay if they leave for a competitor, or that stops them accepting a client.
• Owners: if you fund fieldwork supervision and want repayment, redraft it now to the 18-month, pro-rata, good-cause form, and get counsel's view on whether supervision qualifies at all. Anything signed in 2027 becomes unenforceable in June.
• HR: start a list of current and former staff and contractors whose covenants run past June 30, 2027. That list is your October 1 notice mailing.
• Clinical directors: plan for families following departing BCBAs. From June 30, that's a retention question, not a contract one.