Wage and Hour Defense Blog

Featured on Employment Law This Week:  A California federal judge has ruled that a former GrubHub delivery driver was an independent contractor, not an employee.

The judge found that the company did not have the required control over its drivers for the plaintiff to establish that he is an employee. This decision comes as companies like Uber and Lyft are also facing lawsuits that accuse them of misclassifying employees as independent contractors. Carlos Becerra, from Epstein Becker Green, has more.

Watch the segment below and read our recent post.

Recently, a number of proposed class and collective action lawsuits have been filed on behalf of so-called “gig economy” workers, alleging that such workers have been misclassified as independent contractors. How these workers are classified is critical not only for workers seeking wage, injury and discrimination protections only available to employees, but also to employers desiring to avoid legal risks and costs conferred by employee status.  While a number of cases have been tried regarding other types of independent contractor arrangements (e.g., taxi drivers ...

Our colleagues Michael S. Kun, Jeffrey H. Ruzal, and Kevin Sullivan at Epstein Becker Green co-wrote a “Wage and Hour Self-Audits Checklist” for the Lexis Practice Advisor.

The checklist identifies the main risk categories for wage and hour self-audits. To avoid potentially significant liability for wage and hour violations, employers should consider wage and hour self-audits to identify and close compliance gaps.

Click here to download the Checklist in PDF format.  Learn more about the Lexis Practice Advisor.

This excerpt from Lexis Practice Advisor®, a comprehensive ...

In Tze-Kit Mui v. Massachusetts Port Authority, Massachusetts’ highest court held that Massachusetts law does not require employers to pay departing employees for accrued, unused sick time within the timeframe prescribed for “wages,” as the term is defined by the Massachusetts Wage Act.

In reaching its decision, the Court analyzed the plain meaning of “wages” under the Act and concluded that the legislature did not intend that “wages” would include sick time. The decision removes a significant concern for Massachusetts employers who are strictly liable for ...

In a move allowing increased flexibility for employers and greater opportunity for unpaid interns to gain valuable industry experience, the United States Department of Labor (“DOL”) recently issued Field Assistance Bulletin No. 2018-2, adopting the “primary beneficiary” test used by several federal appellate courts to determine whether unpaid interns at for-profit employers are employees for purposes of the Fair Labor Standards Act. If interns are, indeed, deemed employees, they must be paid minimum wage and overtime, and cannot serve as interns without pay. The ...

As 2017 comes to a close, recent headlines have underscored the importance of compliance and training. In this Take 5, we review major workforce management issues in 2017, and their impact, and offer critical actions that employers should consider to minimize exposure:

1. Addressing Workplace Sexual Harassment in the Wake of #MeToo
2. A Busy 2017 Sets the Stage for Further Wage-Hour Developments
3. Your “Top Ten” Cybersecurity Vulnerabilities
4. 2017: The Year of the Comprehensive Paid Leave Laws
5. Efforts Continue to Strengthen Equal Pay Laws in 2017

In 2017, a great many states and localities passed laws increasing minimum wages beginning on January 1, 2018. (Some passed laws that will be effective on July 1, 2018 or other dates.)

Below is a summary of the minimum wage updates (and related tipped minimum wage requirements, where applicable) that go into effect on January 1, 2018, unless otherwise indicated.

Our colleague Steven M. Swirsky at Epstein Becker Green has a post on the Management Memo blog that will be of interest to our readers: “NLRB Reverses Key Rulings: Returns to Pre-Obama Board Test for Deciding Joint-Employer Status and for Determining Whether Handbooks, Rules and Policies Violate the NLRA – Assessment of 2014 Expedited Election Rules and Future Changes Also Announced.”

Following is an excerpt:

It should come as no surprise that recent days have seen a stream of significant decisions and other actions from the National Labor Relations Board as Board Chairman ...

Federal regulations have long provided that employees whose wages are subject to a tip credit must retain all tips they receive, with the exception that customarily tipped employees -- i.e. front-of the-house service employees -- are permitted to share in tips received.

In 2011, the U.S. Department of Labor (“DOL”) amended its tip regulations to limit tip pool participation to front-of-the-house employees regardless of whether a tip credit was applied to their wages.

Employers and hospitality industry advocacy groups reacted by filing lawsuits throughout the country ...

As we have discussed previously, in early September the U.S. Department of Labor (“DOL”) withdrew its appeal of last November’s ruling from the Eastern District of Texas preliminarily enjoining the Department’s 2016 Final Rule that, among other things, more than doubled the minimum salary required to satisfy the Fair Labor Standards Act’s executive, administrative, and professional exemptions from $455 per week ($23,660 per year) to $913 per week ($47,476 per year).  The DOL abandoned its appeal in light of the district court’s ruling on August 31, 2017 granting ...