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Employment Law

Age Discrimination: ADEA/OWBPA

01/05/2014

HR Law 101: Under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967, employers with 20 or more workers can’t engage in personnel practices that discriminate against individuals age 40 and older. Most age discrimination cases grow out of wrongful discharge and mandatory retirement policies, but they can involve any adverse change in working conditions …

Possible porn: Can we search computers?

01/03/2014
Q. An employee recently complained about re­ceiving inappropriate email messages and links to porno­graphic websites from some of her co-workers. We would like to review the messages to figure out exactly how large a problem we face. Can we do this?

Keep tabs on employees socializing at work

01/03/2014
Sometimes, employees’ social interactions cross the line from productive to disruptive. Before you punish friendly co-workers, consider quantifying their behavior. That makes it easier to defend against charges that you singled out some chatty co-workers for harsher treatment than others based on their protected status.

Offer temp job to driver too injured to drive?

01/03/2014
Q. Recently, one of our delivery drivers was hurt at home and is now unable to drive. Should we offer alternative employment?

Can we withhold double the cost of unreturned equipment from employee’s final paycheck?

01/03/2014
Q. Our employee handbook states, “If you do not return a piece of property we will withhold from your final paycheck the cost of replacing that piece of property.” One of our employees recently quit on the spot. My boss wants to almost double the actual replacement cost of the item. Can we do this?

Parrot Cellular pays $4.2M to stop EBSA squawking

01/03/2014
Executives of Parrot Cellular, a Cen­­tral Valley and Bay Area cellphone retailer, have agreed to pay just under $4.2 million to the company’s em­­ployee stock ownership plan (ESOP) following a probe by the U.S. Depart­­ment of Labor’s Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA). Investigators found that company owners had the plan buy company stock at highly overvalued rates.

State legislation would bar local sick leave ordinances

01/03/2014
State Rep. Seth Grove has proposed legislation law that would prohibit local municipalities from enacting mandatory leave requirements for employers. Grove’s move comes after Philadelphia’s City Council approved a paid leave ordinance, only to have Mayor Michael Nutter veto it.

EBSA sours on Sunkist’s retirement fund accounting

01/03/2014
A U.S. Department of Labor Em­­ployee Benefit Security Admin­­is­­tra­­tion (EBSA) investigation has revealed that Sunkist Growers and its fiduciaries improperly used retirement plan funds to pay salaries and benefits for several employees and managers.

No whistle-blowing if safety rule was unwritten

01/03/2014
The Pennsylvania Whistleblower Law protects employees of government agencies or employers that receive state funding from retaliation for reporting wrongdoing or waste. But the protection doesn’t extend to complaints about unwritten safety rules.

Accommodation delayed may be accommodation denied

01/03/2014
Act fast on reasonable accommodations requests. Lengthy delays may be viewed as an outright denial of accommodations.