Practical HR Tips, News & Advice. Updated Daily.
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 […]
It’s important to be extra careful when evaluating the abilities of an employee who was previously injured and wants to come back to work. Unless you carefully consider the individual’s current skills and recent medical reports, deciding that the worker can’t perform certain tasks can expose you to an expensive discrimination lawsuit for erroneously regarding […]
Tomorrow, it will be six months since President Barack Obama signed health care reform into law. However, September 23 is not only health care reform’s six-month anniversary but also the day several significant provisions under the health care reform package (the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and the Health Care and Education Affordability Reconciliation […]
by Karen Sargeant Americans are not the only ones going to the polls for a federal election this year. Canadians are on their way, too. Despite a planned federal election for October 2009, the Prime Minister just called a federal election, to take place on October 14, 2008. So how would this election affect labor […]
Not all Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) questions have clear answers, and that often can put employers in a quandary, according to Bradd N. Siegel, who spoke on the issue at the recent Advanced Employment Issues Symposium in Nashville, Tennessee. That means employers must understand “where the regulations stop short of giving clear answers […]
A court has decided that an employer who granted federal family leave to someone who wasn’t qualified to take it can later correct its mistake, despite a government regulation that says otherwise. The employer in the case had told a pregnant worker, Susan Seaman, that she was entitled to family leave, but it turned out […]
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has appointed a new labor commissioner, Angela Bradstreet, who previously served as the managing partner for San Francisco-based corporate law firm Carroll, Burdick & McDonough. As the new labor commissioner, Bradstreet will head up the Department of Industrial Relations, within the Labor and Workforce Development Agency.
The Labor Department’s Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs is proposing to end a requirement for visits to the worksites of federal contractors to make limited “compliance checks.” This type of review issued to see if the contractor has maintained proper records and has developed an affirmative action plan. To allow greater flexibility, contractors could […]
Three employees were awarded more than $1 million in damages after claiming that their employer failed to stop a co-worker who was harassing company employees for nearly two decades. The employees, who worked as customer service representatives for Ameritech Corp., alleged the co-worker had harassed 18 women over a 19-year period before finally being fired […]
If you’re planning to close your doors for the holidays to help trim costs, and you want exempt employees to use up their accrued vacation during this period, you may want to review whether your plans comply with state wage and hour rules regarding exempt employees. A recent opinion letter from the state Division of […]