Expert Compliance Insights & Tips for Businesses

December 8, 2009

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DOL Releases 2010 Agenda: Welcome Back, Ergonomics

The Department of Labor (DOL) has released its agenda for the coming year, and it has a few surprises to spring on American business. First (for discussion's sake), the DOL wants each paycheck to come with a stub or explanation of hours worked, overtime paid and everything else that went into the computation of the amount. Next, it's eyeing the resurrection of the ergonomics standard that was r...

December 7, 2009

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David Michaels Confirmed by Voice Vote as OSHA Head

David Michaels

The Senate, without a committee confirmation hearing or discussion on the floor, has approved David Michaels as Deputy Secretary of Labor for Occupational Safety and Health, in other words, the chief of OSHA. Michaels was confirmed along with a host of other nominees in a simple voice vote. Michaels from the beginning was a controversial nominee who views ergonomics as a settled scientific issu...

December 4, 2009

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Happy $40 Million Holiday Present to Mass. Wal-Mart Employees

wage theft Wal-Mart

Nabbed again! Wal-Mart has agreed to fork over $40 million to employees past and present at its Massachusetts outlets after settling a 2001 lawsuit over abuse of time-card data, fudging on overtime and denying employees break time. Employees who worked at those locations from 1995 to the present will receive checks ranging from $400 to $2,500, depending on length of service. This is pretty much...

December 3, 2009

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Jury Is In: Employment Cases On the Rise, Favor Employees

Not only are employment lawsuits on the rise, but so are victories for the employees in both court and the pocketbook. According to Jury Verdict Research, a tracking agency, employees prevailed over employers in 61 percent of all employment trials in 2008 and walked away with a median award of $326,640, up from $204,000 just a year earlier, or a whopping 60 percent rise. Discrimination awards w...

December 2, 2009

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Overtime Rounding Off: Feds Say OK, but Amazon Accused of Cheating

overtime pay

The Department of Labor (DOL) permits companies to round off overtime, "provided that it is used in such a manner that it will not result, over a period of time, in failure to compensate the employees properly for all the time they have actually worked." The New Jersey Department of Labor and Workforce Development disagrees with the DOL and forbids the practice in the Garden State. ...

November 30, 2009

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Cheesecake Factory Forced into Consent Decree Over Sexual Harassment

It's actually just one Cheesecake Factory location in Phoenix that was the subject of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) lawsuit that led to a subsequent consent decree. At that location, the EEOC charged that managers looked the other way while male kitchen staff sexually harassed male service staff, including acts such as dragging them into the refrigerator, grabbing their gen...

November 24, 2009

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GINA May Bar Employers from Social Media Access

Facebook GINA LinkedIn MySpace

Though the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA) has already taken effect, the law's regulations are still in a state of flux at the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and have yet to be finalized. One of the contentious issues that is being weighed internally and through public commentary is the right, or lack thereof, of employers to access employees' or job applic...

November 23, 2009

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Courts Agree Rehab Act Covers Contractors

ADA ADAAA Rehabilitation Act

The Ninth Circuit Court recently ruled that, unlike the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) which covers only those who are in an employee-employer relationship, the Rehabilitation Act is worded more loosely to cover any "otherwise qualified individual." Thus in reviewing a lawsuit against a hospital, the court ruled in favor of an independent contractor who claimed he had been deni...

November 20, 2009

30 view(s)

One in Four Believes a Co-Worker Capable of Violence

In the wake of the workplace murder of Yale student Annie Le and other tales of co-worker-initiated mass violence such as that at Ft. Hood, one in every four Americans believes a co-worker he or she knows is capable of violence, according to a new Rasmussen poll. According to the latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey, 26 percent of employed adults said they seriously thought that ...

November 18, 2009

47 view(s)

DOL Pushes for Mandated Seven Paid Sick Days Minimum

Using the H1N1 pandemic as a selling point for mandating sick leave at work, Department of Labor spokespersons have been testifying in the Senate this week in support of the Healthy Families Act. The proposed bill would require employers to let employees accrue one hour of paid sick leave for every 30 hours worked, capped at 56 hours, or seven days. The bill would also allow employers (naturall...

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