Practical HR Tips, News & Advice. Updated Daily.
California’s innovative Paid Family Leave (PFL) law – the only one in the nation – is now two years old. The program provides most employees with up to six weeks of partial pay when taking leave from work to bond with a new baby or foster or adopted child, or to care for a seriously […]
According to a new California appeals court decision, holding a job open for a disabled employee who needs time to recuperate is a form of reasonable accommodation—where it appears likely the employee will be able to return to work at some time in the foreseeable future. But reasonable accommodation doesn’t require an employer to wait […]
A new study by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation reveals that the percentage of workers who accepted their employer’s offer of healthcare insurance dropped from 85.3 percent in 1998 to 80.3 percent in 2003. The drop means that 3 million fewer workers who are eligible for employer-sponsored health coverage elected to enroll in it over […]
Executive Summary New Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) overtime rules raise the salary threshold for exemption almost threefold, to $455 per week FLSA rules say job title is insufficient to establish exemption Detailed, accurate job descriptions are required to support overtime pay exemption under FLSA guidelines, says Department of Labor (DOL) The U.S. Department of […]
Thinking of hiring teens to work this summer? If so, now’s the time to get a handle on the rules regarding what hours they can work, so you don’t run afoul of state and federal laws.
A Fresno jury has awarded $1.7 million to Janet Orlando, who charged that she was the victim of sexual harassment and battery after she was spanked with a yard sign on three separate occasions in front of her jeering co-workers at Alarm One Inc., a home security company.
According to an analysis by benefits consulting firm Watson Wyatt, the number of large employers that offer only defined contribution/401(k) plans—and not traditional pension plans—is way up. In 2005, 36 percent of Fortune 100 companies offered 401(k) plans only (not in combination with a traditional pension plan), up from 25 percent in 2004 and 17 […]
We have a policy we’re planning to change. We told the affected employees that we will be handling the issue a particular way, but we didn’t explicitly tell them that the new practice is contrary to what is in the handbook, or that we intend to change the policy as it is currently stated in […]
We think that drug use in our company might be growing, and management wants to institute a broad, random testing policy with a zero-tolerance standard. I believe that random testing might be a privacy violation in California. Is it advisable to have a random testing policy, and if not, what do you recommend for curbing […]
Do you think exit interviews are helpful? We just had a case in which an ex-employee, during the exit interview, accused a manager of discrimination. The manager blew it off, saying, “Oh, she’s just a disgruntled employee who’s letting off steam on her way out,” and nothing came of it. I don’t know whether it’s […]