Practical HR Tips, News & Advice. Updated Daily.
Same-sex marriage is not legal in Rhode Island, but employers there must make provision for employees’ same-sex spouses nonetheless. Gov. Lincoln Chafee (I) on May 14 signed an executive order announcing that Rhode Island will recognize the validity of same-sex marriages entered into in states where it is legal. The executive order went into effect […]
A jury in Alameda County has slapped Wal-Mart with a $172 million verdict for denying employees legally required lunch breaks. The verdict came in after just three days of juror deliberation, following a four-month trial in the class-action lawsuit, which filed back in 2002 against the retail giant. Wal-Mart has said it plans to appeal.
National Payroll Week celebrates the hard work by America’s 156 million wage earners and the payroll professionals who pay them. Together, through the payroll withholding system, they contribute, collect, report and deposit approximately $1.8 trillion, or 65.7%, of the annual revenue of the U.S. Treasury. Founded in 1996 by the American Payroll Association, NPW is […]
A new fact sheet summarizing federal employment-related laws is available from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. It’s geared toward smaller businesses, but contains a helpful overview of legal obligations that could be of interest to all employers. It covers subjects such as which employers are subject to federal employment laws, how employees are counted for […]
Contracts that bar employees from working for competitors after they leave your company are unenforceable under California law in most cases. And now such provisions pose an even bigger problem for employers. That’s because a Court of Appeal has recently ruled that you can be sued for insisting employees sign a noncompete agreement as a […]
Unfortunately, the headline also means that 79% of companies did experience new litigation last year, according to a survey by the law firm Fulbright & Jaworski L.L.P. Here are top findings of interest to HR managers. Fulbright’s Fifth Annual Litigation Trends Survey, billed as the “largest canvas of corporate counsel on litigation and trends,” garnered […]
Almost 7 out of 10 American workers report that they plan to have a working retirement, working full- or part-time for pay past normal retirement age—and a full 12 percent say they believe they’ll never be able to retire. Another 14 percent say they want to work as volunteers in their golden years, and just […]
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has announced that it has reached a $20 million settlement of a race discrimination class action filed by the agency against national drug store chain Walgreens, which is based in Illinois. About 10,000 class members will share in the settlement proceeds.
The threat of individual lawsuits is growing, and HR managers are right in the thick of it. Here are tactics for avoiding such suits … and an antilawsuit tool you should be using regularly. Yesterday’s Advisor reported on a troubling increase in plaintiffs in employment law cases filing suit against individual managers as well as […]
The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has released the newly mandated poster it says is necessary to inform employees of their rights under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). The Board issued the final rule requiring most private-sector employers to display the poster on August 25, and it must be in place by November 14. […]