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Wages & Hours

Can we require overtime work?

10/02/2013
Q. When our business gets busy, is it legal for us to require our nonexempt employees to work overtime on occasion?

Don’t let court take employee’s word on hours

10/01/2013
Here’s a case that should send chills down your spine if you don’t keep meticulous records of every hour worked. A court has allowed a case to proceed based on little more than a worker’s vague allegation that she wasn’t paid overtime for hours in excess of 40 per week.

What are the rules on paying for time spent putting on protective gear?

09/30/2013
Q. Our company policy states that employees are not compensated for the time spent changing into their uniforms, which includes special protective wear. A new employee was surprised to find out he couldn’t clock in before getting geared up. Are we required to pay ­workers for that time, or is it up to the discretion of each individual company?

Restaurants face IRS ruling change on tips

09/30/2013
An IRS ruling may change a long-standing practice in the restaurant industry when it takes effect Jan. 1, 2014. Gratuities that restaurants impose on large groups will no longer be considered tips after that date. Instead, restaurants must count them as wages.

EEOC cheesed over pay, hours at Philly fast-food franchise

09/30/2013
Market Burgers, which owns a Checkers fast-food franchise in West Philadelphia, faces charges it pays women less than men and doesn’t let women work as many hours as men.

No place to hide for scofflaw California employers

09/27/2013
If the California Department of Indus­­­trial Relations comes after you, don’t expect to get away with anything illegal. The department reports that since January 2013, a joint enforcement task force of state regulatory agencies looking for pay and safety violations has wound up citing 83% of work sites inspected.

Court sends class action back to drawing board

09/27/2013
In 2011, the U.S. Supreme Court considered a class action against Wal­­mart that included over a million employees who claimed sex discrimination. The court said the ­­employees didn’t have enough in common to band together in one lawsuit (Wal­­mart v. Dukes). Now federal courts are doing the same with much smaller class-action lawsuits—good news for employers.

Appeals court refuses arbitration bid, cites one-sided, coercive agreement

09/27/2013
A California appellate court has invalidated an arbitration agreement on the grounds that it was unconscionable. The court said it was both one-sided and oppressive.

California minimum wage to hit $10 per hour in 2016

09/18/2013
By 2016, California may have the nation’s highest minimum wage—$10 per hour—after the state Legislature approved a two-step plan to raise the rate from its current $8 per hour.

For OT, it’s the truck’s weight classification–not the load–that counts

09/16/2013

Employers have long relied on the truck weight classification—not the actual weight the truck is carrying—to determine whether a driver received overtime. That was recently challenged in a class-action lawsuit.