Legal Question in Business Law in California

Not that I'm aware of, unless there's a contractual provision requiring the notice. There may be consumer protection laws of which I am not familiar.

It's up to you to Read The Friendly Contract at the time you sign it.

The only such provision in California law seems to be in Civil Code section 1945.5, and applies to automatic renewals of residential leases. A contract containing an Evergreen clause might be found "unconscionable" and thus unenforceable because of such clause, but I very much doubt it, especially in the context of something like alarm services, linen supply, landscape maintenance, bottled water, etc.

Fascinating how many attorneys on this site will answer a question without even knowing what it means. California's "Evergreen Law" is a provision of the Government Code pertaining to government employee contracts. It would have absolutely no application to the situation you are asking about.

Tim, the person asking the question probably had in mind the common, generic, nationwide meaning of the term "Evergreen Law," which is exemplified by a Connecticut statute described below. 99 out of 100 LawGuru users who might use the term would be asking about laws regulating "evergreen clauses" (i.e., self-renewal provisions) in contracts of adhesion.

"ROCKY HILL, Conn.--Safe Home Security owner David Roman, who is being sued by the Connecticut Attorney General for violations including illegal renewal of contracts, said he "thought he was acting within the law and I still feel we were acting within the law" when he automatically renewed and enforced alarm contracts that he believed fell outside of this state's 2004 "Evergreen" law.

"On Aug. 2, Conn. Attorney General Richard Blumenthal announced that he was suing Safe Home Security, Safe Home Monitoring and Roman for "violating contract renewal laws, continuing to bill customers who canceled or decided not to renew their service and harassing them when they rightly refused to pay," according to a statement. It also charges Roman with installing and failing to fix faulty equipment and violating state home improvement laws.

"The lawsuit was filed at the request of Conn. Dept of Consumer Protection Commissioner Jerry Farrell.

"The Evergreen law, passed in October 2004, says customers must be given ample notification (15-60 days) that their contracts are about to be renewed, and that customers have the right to cancel contracts within that time frame, according the Attorney General's statement."

As I told the questioner, the only vaguely similar law in California is CC 1945.5. Other statutes in California that deal with automatic renewal are the Government Code sections you mention, the Williamson Act provisions that cause ag-exemption contracts to auto-renew, a few Insurance Code provisions designed to protect insureds, and that's about it.

I submit that I, at least, do know in both the broader national sense as well as the narrow use in California what is meant by an "Evergreen Law."