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Employment Law

Record infraction, punishment for every rules violation

10/21/2009

Make a note every time you take disciplinary action against an employee. You need documentation that explains why each employee was punished.

Review policies so voluntary benefits don’t become mandates

10/20/2009

Can an employer that has fewer than 50 employees within 75 miles of the company’s work site willingly yet unwittingly be bound to provide its employees with FMLA rights and benefits? Maybe so. In Reaux v. Infohealth Management Corp., a federal judge recently ruled that employers that are not otherwise required to provide FMLA leave could wind up subjecting themselves to the FMLA by promising it to employees.

Working-conditions study presents compliance tune-up opportunity

10/20/2009

According to a recent working-conditions survey, many employers are not doing the routine maintenance they should to keep their labor and employment compliance in tip-top shape. There’s no guarantee that tuning up your workplace policies like you do your car will avoid lawsuits. But, some routine preventive maintenance will go a long way to ensuring better compliance and fewer problems.

Time on your side: Learn FLSA ’rounding rule’

10/20/2009

The FLSA allows employers to round off an hourly employee’s arrival or departure time to the nearest five minutes, tenth of an hour or quarter of an hour. But your rounding practices can’t always favor the employer. Rounding must be neutral or it must favor the employee. That means if you round down, you must also round up. You have several ways to make rounding fair:

Confidentiality depends on good e-mail policy

10/20/2009

Employers that don’t enforce reasonable e-mail and computer-access policies—consider yourselves warned. Without such policies and practices, you won’t be able to use the federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act to punish employees who send information through your system to other persons or computers.

Carefully review all post-complaint actions

10/20/2009

Employees who complain about discrimination can win retaliation cases even if it turns out their underlying complaint didn’t amount to discrimination. That’s why it’s so important to review all post-complaint discipline—to make sure it’s fair, justified and not potential retaliation.

Consider specific circumstances when weighing whether to pay for before- or after-work time

10/20/2009

These days, class-action claims for unpaid work time are becoming common—and can get very expensive. That’s one reason to make absolutely sure you properly pay employees for the work they do. Take a careful look at your hourly employees’ workdays—when they start and when they’re done for the day.

Court narrows liability for employee assaults

10/20/2009

The Court of Appeal of California has limited the situations in which an employer will be liable for assaults committed by its employees.

Whistle-blowers protected for flagging shareholder fraud

10/20/2009

The Sarbanes-Oxley Act makes it illegal to retaliate against an employee who blows the whistle on potential shareholder fraud.

Workers’ comp law bars emotional distress claim

10/20/2009

Employees who claim that supervisors harassed them to the point that they became emotionally distraught cannot sue for intentional infliction of emotional distress if the alleged harassment is job related. Instead, they must file a workers’ compensation claim.