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HR Management

FMLA Won’t Cover Tardiness

05/01/2002

Q. Some of our employees routinely ask to use FMLA when they are five, 10 or 15 minutes late. It creates a scheduling nightmare and hurts morale. Does FMLA cover employees who are consistently tardy for work? —M.P., Florida

New risk: Promotion without pay

05/01/2002
After her male supervisor retired, Lynda Hunt was promised a raise and a new job title if she’d take on some of her ex-supervisor’s duties. She agreed and began training, disciplining …

React fast, firmly to harassment; courts will reward your judgment

05/01/2002
A political cover-up usually gets people in bigger trouble than the crime itself. The same is true in the workplace. Trying to sweep employee misbehavior under the rug will only dig …

Sept. 11 attacks affecting attitudes, rulings of juries

04/01/2002
Companies facing jury trials in the near future need to understand that jury attitudes have shifted since the Sept. 11 attacks, says a report by the American Bar Association. …

Quality checks of phone calls don’t give you license to eavesdrop

04/01/2002
An administrative sales assistant at an insurance agency quit after learning that her personal phone calls were being monitored and recorded by her company through a hidden tape recorder. …

Direct employee retirement inquiries to new Labor hotline

04/01/2002
In the wake of the Enron debacle, the U.S. Labor Department has introduced a new toll-free number, (866) 275-7922, for companies and employees who have questions about their retirement …

HIPAA health care privacy rules: They do apply to you

04/01/2002
It’s a common misconception: Employers have been lulled into thinking that the strict privacy provisions of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) apply only to health care providers …

Banning Unsolicited Résumés

04/01/2002

Q. Our company doesn’t want to consider unsolicited résumés as applicants. We are trying to come up with a legally sound definition for “applicant” so we can write an official policy. —H.D., Wisconsin

Don’t use nepotism policy as smoke screen for bias

04/01/2002
Paul Yancey Sr. began working for the railroad in the 1960s and rose to the position of general maintenance foreman. In 1993, his son, Paul Jr., started working there, too. But …

Firing harassers is OK, even without formal company policy

04/01/2002
Machine operator Louvenia Hall complained that a co-worker repeatedly harassed her. When the company investigated, it found that Hall had returned the favor by harassing him, too. The company’s solution: Fire …