Wage and Hour Defense Blog

As if California employers were not already besieged with wage-hour class actions and agency complaints, the state’s controller has now decided to get in on the action.

As The Los Angeles Times reported last week, Controller John Chiang has initiated a new program he calls “Operation Pay-Up” to recover unpaid wages.  The article may be found here. 

In short, the Controller is using California’s Unclaimed Property Law to attempt to gain restitution of wages believed to be withheld from employees.  Any recovered wages that are unclaimed will be transferred to the state treasury ...

In August, Illinois Governor Pat Quinn signed into law HB 5622, amending the Illinois Wage Payment and Collection Act (IWPCA), which now recognizes for the first time payment of wages by payroll card. The law goes into effect on January 1, 2015. While the law provides a new option for Illinois employers, they must be careful to comply with the conditions under which payroll cards may be used.

Under the current Illinois law, employers are required to pay employees via check or direct deposit. The current law is silent as to whether payroll cards, which operate like debit cards, can be used to ...

David W. Garland, Chair of Epstein Becker Green’s Labor and Employment Steering Committee and a member of the firm’s Board of Directors, will moderate “It’s In The Bag – Summary of Bag Check Litigation And Strategies For Minimizing Risk” at the National Retail Federation Human Resources Executive Summit at the Hard Rock Hotel in Chicago, Illinois on October 15, 2014.

During this general session, retailers who are grappling with employee bag check litigation discuss what the industry can expect in litigation over employee compensation for time spent in bag checks to ...

As our readers know, for the purposes of certain blog entries, I have unilaterally declared that I am the Secretary of Labor.

Effective immediately:

1. The “computer professional” exemption applies to anyone with a salary of at least $800 per week whose primary duty requires “highly specialized knowledge of computers and software.”  The exemption now includes employees who provide help desk services, troubleshooting support, or who install hardware or software.
2. In regard to New York law, building owners who provide free apartments to their janitors can still count the value ...

by Michael Kun

We're very pleased to announce that a brand-new version of our free, first-of-its-kind app, the Wage & Hour Guide for Employers, is now available for Apple, Android, and BlackBerry devices. The new app takes advantage of a software-as-a-service programming platform developed by Panvista Mobile.

Our newest version of the app is not only available to users of a variety of devices, but it offers simpler, faster, and more useful ways for employers to locate wage and hour information at the touch of a fingertip.  As new issues are constantly emerging in this area, we’re ...

By: Michael D. Thompson

ESPN broadcaster Keith Olbermann recently held a mock press conference in which he pretended to be the new Commissioner of Baseball, and explained how he would improve the game in that role.  For example, World Series games would start early enough for kids to watch them, the designated hitter would be eliminated, and Vin Scully would call all World Series games.

I’d like to do something similar.  I am pleased to inform you that, for the rest of this blog entry, let’s assume that I am the new Secretary of Labor.

Effective immediately:

1. An employer’s liability to ...

Our colleague Jeffrey H. Ruzal recently wrote an article entitled “Illinois Court Holds That Meal Credit Program Is Valid,” which appears in the September 2014 issue of Hospitality Law.

Following is an excerpt:

Providing an employee meal program may be a nice gesture, but requires companies that do so to maintain proper records in case their meal plans are challenged.  An Illinois appellate court recently affirmed a circuit court’s dismissal of plaintiff restaurant worker’s class action claim that defendant restaurant employer took improper deductions from ...

In Sarceno v. Choi, the defendants operated a supermarket in Washington D.C.  Three of the defendants had previously been sued by different employees in a proposed collective action (“the Munoz suit”) under the FLSA and other statutes. 

The Munoz suit was resolved through settlement decrees approved by the District Court.

At approximately the same time they were settling the Munoz suit, the defendants presented five other employees (who performed activities similar to those of the Munoz plaintiffs) with “settlement agreements” purportedly releasing the defendants from ...

As if traffic in California was not bad enough by itself, employers in the trucking industry have one more thing to worry about – whether they are complying with California’s meal and rest break laws.  In  Dilts v. Penske Logistics, LLC, the plaintiffs represent a class of delivery drivers and installers.  Defendants had hoped to avoid the claim that they had violated California’s meal and rest break laws by arguing that as “motor carriers” the Federal Aviation Administration Authorization Act of 1994 (“FAAAA”) preempts California’s meal and rest break laws.  The trial ...

By:  Amy Messigian

In a major blow to California employers who utilize a monthly commission scheme but pay biweekly or semimonthly salary to their commission sales employees, the California Supreme Court ruled earlier this week in Peabody v. Time Warner Cable, Inc. that a commission payment may be applied only to the pay period in which it is paid for the purposes of determining whether an employee is exempt from overtime.  Employers may not divide the commission payment across multiple pay periods in order to satisfy the minimum compensation threshold for meeting the exemption in any ...