Year-end bonuses go hand-in-hand with happier holidays, but it’s crucial employers do not misstep into wage and hour violations. Be sure your goodwill gesture does not end up causing more harm than good with the following tips.
The Department of Labor collects millions of dollars from employers in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act each year. Avoid these costly mistakes.
Related legal obligations Employees love to receive them, and employers may even love to give them, but rewarding good performance with bonus pay is not always a straightforward, isolated transaction. Most employers are familiar with the legal requirement to pay non-exempt employees, i.e. hourly employees (and even some who aren’t), for overtime hours at a...
by Emily Gaston. Employers should be aware that the Social Security Administration (SSA) has recently reinstated the practice of issuing Employer Correction Notices, also known as “no-match letters.” If this is your first time hearing about the revival, consider yourself lucky and keep reading. No-match letters are not a new practice for the SSA; they...
by Amy Thomson. Employers required to file an annual EEO-1 report should have submitted Component 1 data by May 31, 2019, unless they requested a two-week extension (to June 14, 2019). However, Component 2 data, a new requirement, must be submitted for the years 2017 and 2018 by September 30, 2019. Who is required to...
by Amy Thomson. Did you miss our previous posts about FLSA when it comes to tips? You can always access them online to learn more about this important topic: Part 1: What is the FLSA tip credit? Part 2: Who qualifies as a tipped employee? Part 3: What about tipped employees who have multiple roles...
by Amy Thomson. Don’t miss our previous posts where we introduced the FLSA tip credit, delved into who qualifies as a tipped employee, and discussed the complexities for tipped employees who have multiple roles with the same employer. Only one post remains in this in-depth series about FLSA and tipping. Today, you’ll learn about what...
by Amy Thomson. More than likely, you have heard about the U.S. Department of Labor’s (DOL) proposed rule change that would increase the salary level requirement for the Executive, Administrative, and Professional (EAP) and highly-compensated employee (HCE) exemptions under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). If you’re not sure what we’re talking about, read our...
by Amy Thomson. Don’t miss our previous posts where we introduced the FLSA tip credit and discussed who qualifies as a tipped employee. We still have two more posts to round out this important topic. In this post, we go into more detail about tipped employees, particularly those who have more than one role with...
by Amy Thomson. Don’t miss our previous post where we introduced the FLSA tip credit, and be on the lookout for more posts as we continue to delve into this important topic. Today, we’re looking at who qualifies as a tipped employee. Who Qualifies as a Tipped Employee? Tipped employees work in an occupation where...
by Amy Thomson. The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) allows employers to satisfy their minimum wage obligations to tipped employees by paying them a reduced cash wage and treating their tips as a credit toward the remainder owed. Sounds simple enough, right? Wrong. That’s why we’ll be discussing this topic in-depth over the course of several...
by Todd Stanton. Take another look at the photo for this post. Beautiful, isn’t it? It’s Bali. It’s from a villa on a Wednesday morning early last December. The butler had just placed the floating breakfast for two in the couple’s private infinity pool. The weather was perfect—right between 78 and 84 degrees all afternoon....
by Amy Thomson. Calculating Your Employees’ Regular Rate of Pay Under the FLSA The US Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division (WHD) collected a record-breaking $304 million in back wages and damages from employers in 2018. It’s imperative employers better understand their Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) obligations. Then companies will be in a...
Just because something is legal doesn’t mean you should do it. Lawyers lacking this perspective get tangled up in small disputes. They forget their job is to get the business back to productive work as quickly as possible.
Companies hire interns for various reasons – often primarily to save money while at the same time giving an up-and-comer in the business world an opportunity to gain valuable experience. Some companies choose to hire unpaid interns to maximize the economic benefit. However, while hiring an unpaid intern may appear economically beneficial, it could prove...
Earlier this year, the U.S. Department of Labor published a new rule that will increase the salary requirements for “exempt” employees under the Fair Labor Standards Act. The time for complying with the new rule is just around the corner – the regulation goes into effect on December 1, 2016 regardless of the pending new...
For employers who are required to file an annual EEO-1 report, beginning in March 2018, the EEOC will also require those employers to report various types of pay data on their employees. The new rule changes the scope of the data that must be reported, the timing of the data collection, and the reporting deadline....
If you are an American seeking to do business in Europe, or vice versa, it is useful to have an overview of the cultural and legal differences between the two continents to understand how these impact the respective work cultures. As each state in the U.S. and each country in Europe has its own quirks,...
Manori de Silva is taking on the International Sector at Stanton Law. Qualified as an attorney in England (solicitor) and the United States, she uses her understanding of cultural differences to help European companies to do business in the United States. She also helps American companies navigate the complex web of worker protections in Europe. Click here to check out...
Transgender issues are in the news as of late, most notably surrounding transgender individuals and the use of public restrooms. What would you, as an employer, do if an issue involving a transgender employee were to arise in your workplace? What happens if a transgender employee wants to use the restroom of her choice and...
https://youtu.be/wZU3VnwDf1E
The work is piling up and you could really use an extra pair of hands around the office. But you’re managing labor costs. Even though the economy has improved, it’s a competitive world out there. We’re all doing more with less. An unpaid intern seems to be the answer. Talk about the best of all...
Affordable Care Act The U.S. Supreme Court affirmed the Fourth Circuit Court decision in King v. Burwell, holding that individuals who get their health insurance through the federal government exchange will be eligible for tax subsidies under the Affordable Care Act. The decision leaves employers in largely the same position they’ve faced since ACA’s passage,...
Last Thursday, President Obama announced his directive to the Department of Labor to begin the process of revising federal regulations to expand the number of Americans eligible for overtime under Fair Labor Standards Act. He specifically targeted the “white collar” exemptions from overtime, including the administrative, executive, and professional exemptions. Currently, employers paying certain employees...
We’ve received several contacts from clients and other lawyers concerning employment issues that have come up as a result of the inclement weather. Here’s a few quick answers to common questions (under Georgia and federal law), but please let me know if you have others or need a more thorough explanation about anything covered here:...
Beginning January 2014, the IRS will begin enforcing guidance it published in a June 2012 ruling classifying automatic gratuities on restaurant checks as service charges and not tips. Many restaurants include automatic gratuities on checks for large parties or in the event of special promotions or discounts (Groupon or Scoutmob deals, for example) to ensure...
The Department of Labor has issued temporary guidance outlining the requirements of the notice provision that the Affordable Care Act (ACA) added to the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). Under FLSA Section 18B, employers must distribute notices announcing the existence of the Health Insurance Marketplace (i.e., the “Exchanges”) created by Health Reform, and explaining the...
The practice of awarding “comp time,” i.e. paid time off in lieu of wages for hours worked in excess of 40, is not currently permitted for private-sector employers. As the Fair Labor Standards Act is currently written, employers must pay employees wages at a rate of 1.5 times their regular rate for all hours over...
Who is an artist? For that matter, who gets to decide? These are existential questions rarely touched upon by folks who are not artists themselves. But if your business employs creative types, you, unfortunately, must also wade into this philosophical quagmire, at least for the purposes of determining whether the artist is entitled to overtime...
A recent call from one of my favorite clients prompted this post. His question: I have non-exempt employees who travel internationally for business. They sit on the plane for a long time going to and from assignments. Do I have to pay them to watch in-flight movies? My answer: It depends. And the factors on...
Most employers are too busy with their day-to-day operations to expend much bandwidth wringing their hands over the nuances of employment-law compliance. With this in mind, take a quick look at a rundown of the four most common employment law issues we see in our practice. Simply knowing that these land mines are out there...
Especially in these tough economic times, your company is looking to cut labor costs however it can. And if you can, at the same time do, a favor for a deserving young person looking to gain industry experience, all the better. An unpaid intern for your organization, then, would seem like a great idea, right? ...
The most common problem I’ve encountered since opening up my practice is employers who are not compensating their employees correctly. Unfortunately for these employers, wage and hour cases are big business for plaintiffs’ attorneys, and the Department of Labor loves making examples out of unsuspecting employers who are, in many cases, simply uninformed about the...