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

Compensation & Benefits

Election Day: Mandatory time off to work the polls?

09/09/2008
Q. An employee who has already used all of his PTO for the year recently requested a day off on Nov. 4, 2008, to serve as an election judge. Do we have to give him the day off? …

WMI hit with overtime suit contesting break practices

09/09/2008
A group of current and former drivers and ride-along helpers for Waste Management Inc. (WMI) has filed a lawsuit claiming the company routinely required them to work through breaks without pay to finish their routes on time …

Mortenson Co. sued under FLSA

09/09/2008
David Keef, a former field engineer for M.A. Mortenson Company, a commercial construction firm based in Minneapolis, has filed a lawsuit claiming the company misclassified his position as exempt from overtime …

Under what circumstances must we pay interns?

09/09/2008

Q. My company would like to hire several college students as interns to work on special projects. Because the work has educational value, we are wondering if the internships can be unpaid. Can we do this? …

Accommodation can include FMLA leave to avoid OT

09/08/2008
Sometimes employers must require their employees to work overtime to meet production goals. That can be a problem if one of the workers has a disability that prevents him from working more than 40 hours per week. It’s perfectly legal to require that the employee use accumulated sick time and FMLA leave to avoid those overtime hours …

Staffing firm CEO accused of skimming $182 million in taxes

09/08/2008
Frank Amodeo, head of Mirabilis Ventures in Orlando, has been indicted on 27 counts of conspiracy and fraud for allegedly stealing $182 million in payroll taxes from thousands of businesses across the state …

Check pay rates for employees who regularly swap work

09/08/2008
Employees who allege EPA violations must show that they receive lower pay than a comparable employee of the opposite sex. That comparable employee must perform substantially equal work in the same establishment as the employee charging discrimination. Under those terms, employees who switch workloads as needed and share supervision are probably comparable employees … 

By the Numbers: Which functions does HR outsource?

09/05/2008

Retirement plan administration and health and wellness programs lead the list of functions HR departments ask outside firms to perform …

Arbitration agreement may be used for USERRA claims

09/05/2008

While USERRA may be comprehensive and quite broad, there is at least one area that courts seem willing to concede can be changed. The 6th Circuit Court of Appeals has recently ruled that employees and employers who agree to arbitrate disputes can include USERRA claims in that arbitration agreement …

Raise arbitration early—or else find yourself in court

09/05/2008

Does your organization have arbitration agreements in place for some employees, but not others? Then make sure you keep careful track of whose cases should go to arbitration and whose should not. If one of your employees sues in court, you may lose the right to arbitration if you don’t object to the lawsuit quickly …