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Alabama

Minor sleep problems don’t a disability make

10/01/2007

Does your office look like the set for the latest sleep-medication commercial? You know, the one where employees drag themselves to work while their dreams come to visit them. These days it seems almost everyone is a bit sleep deprived. But don’t let bleary-eyed employees make excuses for tardiness. The fact  is, while insomnia can be a disability under the ADA, very few cases are severe enough to qualify as a disability.

Is everyone in your company treated equally? Here’s how to track

10/01/2007

Do you have ready access to your organization’s discipline records? Can you say with certainty that everyone charged with the same misconduct receives the same punishment? Or is there bias hiding in those records? The best way to check is to group discipline by type of misconduct and punishment …

Public employers: Beware association discrimination

10/01/2007

Here’s a trap for unwary public employers. Public employees can sue their agencies if they experience discrimination based on their association with persons of different races. That’s why it’s important to keep things professional and avoid any comments on an employee’s personal life or choice of associates …

Is your arbitration clause broad enough to protect you?

10/01/2007

If you use an arbitration clause to limit federal lawsuits, now is a good time to review the terms. As an employer in the 11th Circuit, you can require employees to arbitrate just about any employment dispute. That can be a distinct advantage, especially as more and more attorneys representing employees push for class-action lawsuits. If employees agree to arbitration, it’s far less likely the case will mushroom to include all similarly situated employees …

Don’t use attendance policy to avoid accommodations

09/01/2007

While attendance is an important goal, refusing to allow disabled employees some leeway is a sure way to the courtroom. Before you adopt a strict no-excuses tardiness policy, make sure you consider the special problems disabled employees may have. You can’t just declare that being on time is an essential function of every job and leave it at that …

‘Keep it confidential’ may let employers off liability hook

09/01/2007

You have a robust sexual harassment  policy, and everyone from the lowest level employee to the company president knows how it works. But what happens if an employee tells a supervisor about possible harassment and then asks him or her not to take it up with HR? …

Manager wounded after guards were eliminated sues bank

09/01/2007

A SunTrust Bank manager, who was wounded during a bank robbery, has sued the bank because it had eliminated security guard positions for economic reasons just before the robbery …

Georgia ‘Donning and doffing’ case headed to high court?

09/01/2007

You may remember that the U.S. Supreme Court decided a donning and doffing case about a year ago. That might have been the end of the matter. But nothing is simple when it comes to employment law. Recently, a three-judge panel of the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that workers cannot demand pay for time spent donning and doffing their uniforms in most circumstances …

Humiliation, not just physical threats, can be harassment

08/01/2007

Train supervisors to be on the lookout for all forms of sexual harassment, not just blatant abuse …

Review job description to reflect realities of position

08/01/2007

Employers who don’t specify essential functions and don’t ensure their job descriptions are up to date risk “function creep” in which the employee slowly, informally whittles away at the job to the point some tasks appear no longer essential …