• The HR Specialist - Print Newsletter
  • HR Specialist: Employment Law
  • The HR Weekly

Compensation & Benefits

Minimum wage increase: not 2012, maybe 2013

03/08/2012
President Obama’s push to raise the minimum wage from its current $7.25 per hour to $9.50 will likely fall on deaf ears in Congress this year.

Plan for the inevitable: How to handle lost W-2s

03/06/2012

Employees call Payroll every year saying they’ve lost their W-2s. Dealing with such requests can become a time-consuming headache, especially for larger organizations. Here are some tips for managing the reissued W-2 process.

Cuyahoga expands benefits for gay workers’ children

03/05/2012
By a vote of 6-4, Cuyahoga County commissioners have approved a measure that will provide health insurance benefits to the children of gay partners of county employees.

Manage work, play with formal vacation policy

03/05/2012

Many workers routinely skip vacations, handing back to employers more than $21 billion in unused vacation time each year. In fact, vacation is good for business—it lowers employee stress and prevents burnout. Consider your vacation policy an important element of your organization’s health.

Court: No unemployment for quitting to follow spouse

03/05/2012
The Court of Appeals of Ohio has let stand a decision that denied unemployment benefits to a woman who quit her job so she could move with her husband to California.

FMLA: It’s not your job to decide whether relative needs your employee’s help

03/05/2012
The FMLA provides leave for employees who need to care for seriously ill family members. Some employers argue that if several family members are providing care, they don’t have to approve FMLA leave if that means more than one family member would be present. That argument won’t fly.

Form W-2c: the agony of errors

03/02/2012
The earlier employers fix errors on 2011 W-2s, the less likely it is they’ll be penalized by the IRS. E-filers have until the April 2 to file original W-2s, but even those few extra weeks may not be enough to get off the W-2c hook for mistakes that come to your attention after e-filing.

Spring forward! Daylight saving time begins March 11

03/01/2012
Daylight saving time begins at 2 a.m., March 11. Graveyard-shift workers, therefore, will work only seven hours that day. If you pay those employees for a standard eight-hour shift, don’t include the extra hour’s pay when calculating their regular rates to determine overtime.

Workers’ comp: Facebook ‘evidence’ can be used

02/28/2012
When an Arkansas employee tried to get workers’ comp benefits due to a back injury, the administrative law judge found there was no medical evidence to support the claim. One strike against the worker: photos on Facebook that seemed to show him moving fine while drinking and partying.

Former employees to collect overdue profit-sharing funds

02/27/2012
Mentor-based North Coast Wood Products has settled a Department of Labor lawsuit alleging the company’s owner illegally diverted money from 11 participants in the now-defunct company’s profit-­sharing plan.