The 75-day presumption's two-piece range

For most workers, a filed claim is presumed compensable if the insurer does not reject it within 90 days. For public-safety presumption claims, SB 1127 cut that to 75 — and wrote the section range in two deliberate pieces. The pieces are where the interesting law lives.

What § 5402(b)(2) says, precisely

Under Labor Code § 5402(b)(2), a claim within §§ 3212 to 3212.85 and §§ 3212.9 to 3213.2 — the cancer, heart trouble, pneumonia, PTSD and related presumptions for firefighters, peace officers and other covered public-safety members — must be rejected within 75 days of the claim form being filed, not the ordinary 90. Miss the window and the injury is presumed compensable, rebuttable only by evidence discovered after the window closed.

Why the range skips three sections

The gap in § 5402(b)(2)'s range between 3212.85 and 3212.9 is not sloppy drafting — subdivision (b)(2) steps around §§ 3212.86–3212.88, the COVID-19 presumptions (repealed January 1, 2024), which kept the ordinary 90-day period while they were in force. Meanwhile SB 1127's other provision, § 5414.3 — the five-times penalty for unreasonable rejection of a presumption claim, capped at $50,000 — reaches "Sections 3212 to 3213.2, inclusive" — unbroken. The two provisions do not cover the same sections.

So on a COVID presumption claim, the rejection deadline stayed at 90 days while the five-times penalty applied anyway. Because those repealed sections sunset on January 1, 2024, this now matters only for claims still open from that window — but if you have one, it is worth raising.