November 2015

Most employers are aware that violations of the Fair Labor Standards Act can result in an investigation by the U.S. Department of Labor, leading to back pay damages, as well as possible liquidated damages in an amount equal to back pay, and even civil penalties up to $1000 for each willful or repeated violation. prison-silhouetteState departments of labor may also conduct such investigations for violations of state wage and hour laws, which can result in similar monetary consequences. Employees may also bring a lawsuit against their employer in federal or state court.  But what many employers don’t know is that they could even end up in jail!

Under the FLSA, willful violations can result in criminal prosecution, with a second conviction resulting in imprisonment! State laws can be even more aggressive, as a Papa John’s franchisee recently learned to his dismay.Continue Reading Making Up Fake Employees Can Land You in Jail

As the Wall Street Journal reported this week, the Department of Labor’s (DOL) highly anticipated rules regarding employees’ eligibility for overtime are not likely to be finalized until sometime in mid to late 2016. This timeline, which is later than the Spring-time anticipated date, was acknowledged by the Department of Labor (DOL) Solicitor, Patricia Smith, during the American Bar Association, Labor and Employment Section Conference two weeks ago. I attended the panel at which Solicitor Smith spoke, and counsel for both management and employees were surprised by this revelation.

portraitAs my firm previously reported, in June 2015, the DOL proposed revisions to the overtime rules. The proposed rules significantly increased the required salary for employees to qualify as exempt. The current salary threshold is $23,660. The proposed rules more than double it to $50,400! Clearly, this is a significant increase and would make many more employees eligible for overtime pay.

Solicitor Smith said the reason for the delay in the issuance of the final rules is the significant number of comments that were received by the DOL, which are in excess of 200,000!  This is three times more than the number of comments received by the DOL when it revised the regulations back in 2004.Continue Reading From the DOL Solicitor’s Mouth to Our Ears: Update on DOL’s Overtime Rules

So I found this case, Smith v. URS Corp., interesting because it involved a black employee Dollar signwho got what he wanted, but was still able to sue for discrimination.

The black employee received the job he applied for (training specialist) and more pay than he asked for ($57,668 instead of $46,000). He was given a classification title and job code of “Senior Training Specialist (65010)” and a job grade of S5.12. Five months later, a white applicant applied for the same training specialist job but asked for a $65,000 salary. He was hired into a Senior Training Specialist role at his requested salary, with a classification title and job code of “Staff Training Specialist (65010) and a job grade of S5.13. Shortly after that, another black applicant applied for a training specialist position with a desired salary of “58K to 65K.” He was given the same job title, classification, code and grade as the other black employee.

The first black employee sued for race discrimination after he was terminated pursuant to a reduction in force. The trial court threw out his claims on summary judgment before trial because the black employee had received the job he wanted and more pay than he sought. (Hmm, that seems pretty logical, doesn’t it?)Continue Reading Giving Employees What They Want Doesn’t Preclude Discrimination Claim

As you may know, the National Labor Relations Board substantially revised the rules governing the union elections process, by which employees choose whether or not they wish to be represented by a union. The controversial revisions greatly sped up the process, with the effect that employer had less time to educate their employees about the impact of unionization before an election is held – which means more unionization (hence the controversy!).

These revised “quickie election” rules took effect in April 2015. Because the rules themselves were not troubling enough for employers, we now have to contend with the Board’s expansive interpretation of those rules. Here’s an example of what I mean.

As part of the election process, the employer must provide a voter list to the union, containing the names and contact information for all employees eligible to vote in the election. Before the revisions, this list consisted of the names and addresses of eligible voters. This information is readily available from a company’s human resources department, through its database or records. The revised rule, however, requires that the list must now include “available” personal e-mail addresses, and home and cell phone numbers.Voting List

What does this mean? Well, in the Danbury Hospital of the Western Connecticut Health Network case, the employer generated a list from its HR database. The list contained the addresses and emails for all the eligible voters, and phone number for 94% of them.
Continue Reading NLRB Imposes Expansive (and Onerous) Requirements For Preparation of Voter List