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Employment Law

SoCal UFCW locals reach agreement with Rite Aid

08/15/2008
Rite Aid drugstores recently reached tentative agreements on two new three-year contracts with seven locals of the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) union. The new agreements will cover approximately 7,100 Southern California clerks and pharmacists working at 400 Rite Aid stores …

State court issues restraining order to bar AFSCME strike of UC

08/15/2008
On July 11, a California state court issued a restraining order prohibiting Local 3299 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) from invoking a planned strike against facilities at the University of California …

Can we do anything about employees discussing pay with one another?

08/15/2008

Q. Can we prohibit workers from discussing their pay with each other? This practice appears to be creating workplace conflict and damaging morale in the office …

Document promotion rationale to derail claims from runners-Up

08/13/2008
Employees who complain about discrimination or offer to support another’s discrimination complaint sometimes fear that doing so will blacklist them from promotions or raises. When they, in fact, lose out on promotions, those denials can confirm their fears—and prompt them to file lawsuits. You can put a stop to that by making it absolutely clear why you chose to promote the person you did …

Tracking all discipline makes it easier to defend lawsuits

08/13/2008
Employees who are fired frequently sue, alleging some form of discrimination. A fired employee may say, for example, that she was treated differently than her male co-worker who allegedly committed the same workplace offense. Smart employers keep careful track of all disciplinary actions and use progressive disciplinary programs to differentiate among employees …

Keep exact timecards, or court will use worker’s estimate

08/13/2008
Here’s an incentive to make sure you account for every hour your nonexempt employees work: If an employee claims you didn’t pay her what you were supposed to, and you don’t have accurate time records, the court will calculate what you owe based on the number of hours the employee tells the court she worked …

Tell managers: No discrimination for in vitro fertilization

08/13/2008
The Pregnancy Discrimination Act (PDA) prohibits discrimination “because of or on the basis of pregnancy, childbirth or related medical conditions.” Until now, it was an open question whether that law covered fertility treatments. Now the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that employers can’t punish female employees for undergoing in vitro fertilization …

Be sure ‘Shared’ employees don’t put you over FMLA limit

08/13/2008
Many small employers aren’t covered by the FMLA because they don’t have 50 or more employees. But if you’re considering adding temp help from an outside agency to handle a workload spike, get out your calculator first. If you’re not careful, you could wind up triggering FMLA liability for everyone who works for you …

Think the case is settled? Not until the employee signs on dotted line

08/13/2008
Sometimes, in the urge to quickly resolve an employment-related lawsuit, the employer, the employee and their lawyers agree on a settlement offer and assume the case is over. Big mistake!

New administration doesn’t signal open season for retaliation complaints

08/13/2008
Public employers can’t discriminate against applicants because they decide to speak out on matters of political importance. That would violate the First Amendment. And that protection includes the right to membership in a political party. But not every case that carries a slight whiff of politics winds up creating a big legal stink …