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The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to resolve conflicting lower court decisions about whether people who are HIV-positive, but don’t have any AIDS symptoms, automatically qualify as disabled under the Americans with Disabilities Act. The case, which involved the part of the law dealing with discrimination in public accommodations, arose when a dentist refused to […]
One of your employees fails to return to work following a leave. Despite repeated attempts to contact her, you hear nothing and receive no explanation for her continued absence. Finally, you terminate her. But then she turns around and sues you for violating the Americans with Disabilities Act, claiming she was having a manic depressive […]
Under federal law, employees who are exempt from the overtime rules must usually be paid a fixed salary regardless of the number of hours they work. But suppose an exempt employee does extra work and you want to compensate them for it? Many legal experts had believed that additional pay would jeopardize an employee’s exempt […]
Suppose you have an employee who is off work because of an injury. When the employee’s doctor gives them the green light to return without limitations, you may still be concerned that the person cannot do their job properly. So you ask the worker to first undergo a fitness-for-duty evaluation. If the employee refuses, […]
If a pregnant employee is injured at work and her baby is born with problems, the child can later sue you for damages. That’s the latest word from the California Supreme Court. This new decision could open the door to expensive lawsuits involving fetal injury claims-which won’t be covered by workers’ compensation laws that limit […]
Most employers know that state and federal anti-discrimination laws require you to offer reasonable accommodations to disabled workers to allow them to perform their jobs. But applying this seemingly straightforward rule to real-life situations is often trickier than it sounds. In several recent cases, employers have found themselves on the wrong end of expensive lawsuits […]
Governor Wilson recently approved a measure changing the little-known but important statute that allows employees to take unpaid time off to participate in their children’s school activities. The law continues to apply to private, state and municipal em- ployers who have 25 or more employees working in the same location. Our HR Management & Compliance […]
Over the past few years, pension benefits have come under increased scrutiny by employee advocates who claim benefits are often miscomputed and thus underpaid. If you’re targeted and it turns out you under-calculated retirees’ benefits, you might be surprised to find you owe a lot more money than you set aside. In response to the […]
Several counties, and possibly other public employers as well, may soon be paying out a lot more in retirement benefits. The reason is a new decision by the state Supreme Court that said a Southern California county improperly excluded certain cash payments when calculating pensions under the County Employees’ Retirement Law. Retirees File Suit In […]
It’s common to ask employees who accept early retirement to agree to waive future legal claims against you in exchange for higher pension payouts. But is it legal? Two years ago, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal ruled that Lockheed Corporation violated the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) when it did just that. The […]