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Wages & Hours

Off-hours training: Paid or unpaid?

09/14/2011
Q. We are requiring some hourly employees to take additional training. Those who work the day shift can attend the training in lieu of work. But employees who work the night shift will have to come in during the day. Must we pay extra for the night shift employees to attend the training?

BellSouth ‘managers’ win class certification

09/13/2011

A federal judge has allowed an FLSA class-action lawsuit against BellSouth Telecommunications to move forward. The class consists of “level-one” managers who claim they have been misclassified so the company won’t have to give them overtime pay.

Butler County contemplates settling bias claims

09/02/2011
Butler County may have to pony up more than $100,000 to settle claims it discriminated against a small group of female county employees, all over age 40, who were forced to take pay cuts last year.

DOL building pay database to spot discrimination

09/02/2011
The DOL has requested public comment on its proposed pay-and-benefit database for federal contractors. The database would show what pay and benefits federal contractors offered to employees with an eye toward spotting potential pay disparities that may discriminate against women and minority employees.

Former TSU hoops coach wins $730,000 for sex bias

09/02/2011
Former Texas Southern University women’s basketball coach Surina Dixon has won $730,000 in a sex discrimination and retaliation lawsuit she filed after being fired in 2008, shortly after she was hired.

Reason prevails: Court limits supersized class actions

09/02/2011
Courts are beginning to rein in col­­lec­tive actions, in which a few com­­plaints about unpaid overtime can explode into massive litigation if courts aren’t careful.

Cut pay if warranted: It’s OK under FLSA

09/01/2011
The Fair Labor Standards Act grants many rights to workers, in­­cluding the right to overtime pay for working more than 40 hours in a workweek. It does not, however, prevent employers from lowering hourly wages if they choose to do so.

Don’t micromanage store managers

09/01/2011
Want to keep exempt status in place for your store managers? One key is to make sure regional managers don’t micromanage the store. Giving store managers autonomy helps show they truly do have managerial authority.

Working online before commuting: Is drive time paid?

08/30/2011

Many employees spend time at home before or after their workday checking email. For nonexempt employees, that work could count as paid time if it amounts to a “substantial” amount of time. But now some hourly employees have begun to raise a related issue: If they start the day with a few work emails, shouldn’t they be paid for the time they spend commuting to work?

Philly airport Legal Sea Foods wraps up odd pay policy

08/23/2011
Sometimes unique workplace situations lead to creative solutions, but those solutions aren’t always, well, legal. Legal Sea Foods’ location at the Philadelphia International Airport has two positions that apparently exist nowhere else in the chain: silverware rollers.