Workforce Bulletin

Our colleague Nancy L. Gunzenhauser, an Associate at Epstein Becker Green, has a post on the Retail Labor and Employment Blog that will be of interest to many of our readers in the hospitality industry: "Reminder: All Philadelphia Employers Must Post New Ban-the-Box Poster."

Following is an excerpt:

One of the requirements of the amended Philadelphia ban-the-box law has gone into effect. As of March 14, 2016, Philadelphia employers are required to post a new poster provided by the Philadelphia Commission on Human Relations in a conspicuous place on both the employer’s website and ...

[caption id="attachment_2487" align="alignright" width="113"] Nancy L. Gunzenhauser[/caption]

One of the requirements of the amended Philadelphia ban-the-box law has gone into effect. As of March 14, 2016, Philadelphia employers are required to post a new poster provided by the Philadelphia Commission on Human Relations in a conspicuous place on both the employer’s website and on premises, where applicants and employees will be most likely to notice and read it.

The amended law strengthens the prohibition on requesting criminal conviction information prior to a ...

The top story on Employment Law This Week is the EEOC's announcement of new nationwide disclosure rules for position statements.

Retroactive to January 1, 2016, employers should expect the disclosure of their position statements to the charging party, even if the statement contains confidential information. Under the new policy, complainants have the right to request access to the statement and respond to it, but any response from the charging party will not be disclosed to the employer in turn. Lauri Rasnick, a Member of the Firm at Epstein Becker Green, has more on what this ...

Section 806 of SOX prohibits publicly traded companies, as well as their subsidiaries, contractors, subcontractors, and agents, from taking adverse personnel actions against employees for reporting activity that they reasonably believe constitutes mail fraud, wire fraud, bank fraud, securities fraud, or a violation of any Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) rule or federal law relating to fraud against shareholders. In recognition of the legislative intent underlying SOX—to provide strong and broad-based protections for employees who report suspected ...

On February 25, 2016, Congressman Elijah E. Cummings (D-MD) and Senator Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) introduced the Whistleblower Augmented Reward and Nonretaliation Act of 2016 (or WARN Act of 2016) (pdf). The bill proposes expanded protections for individuals who blow the whistle on financial fraud and securities violations and, if enacted, could have significant implications for financial services employees and employers alike.  Specifically, the WARN Act of 2016 aims to strengthen the protections and incentives available to financial crimes whistleblowers by amending the ...

The Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”) permits employers to use “tip credits” to satisfy minimum wage obligations to tipped employees.  Some employers use those “tip credits” to satisfy the minimum wage obligations; some do not.  (And in some states, like California, they cannot do so without running afoul of state minimum wage laws.)

Many hospitality employers use “tip pools” to divide customer tips among staff.  Those “tip pools” normally provide for tips to be divided among “front of the house” employees who are involved in serving customers – servers ...

[caption id="attachment_2472" align="alignright" width="113"] Laura C. Monaco[/caption]

This week, the EEOC filed its first two federal lawsuits that frame allegations of sexual orientation-based harassment and discrimination as claims of unlawful "sex discrimination" under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

In EEOC v. Pallet Companies the EEOC alleges that an employee's night-shift manager harassed her because of her sexual orientation by making repeated offensive comments (sometimes accompanied by sexually suggestive gestures), such as "I want to turn you back ...

Our colleague Joshua A. Stein has a Retail Labor and Employment Law Blog post that will be of interest to many of our technology industry readers: “Defending Against Website Accessibility Claims: Recent Decisions Suggest the Primary Jurisdiction Doctrine Is Unlikely to Serve As Businesses’ Silver Bullet.”

Following is an excerpt:

For businesses hoping to identify an avenue to quickly and definitively defeat the recent deluge of website accessibility claims brought by industrious plaintiff’s firms, advocacy groups, and government regulators in the initial ...

Our colleague Joshua A. Stein has a Retail Labor and Employment Law Blog post that will be of interest to many of our financial services industry readers: “Defending Against Website Accessibility Claims: Recent Decisions Suggest the Primary Jurisdiction Doctrine Is Unlikely to Serve As Businesses’ Silver Bullet.”

Following is an excerpt:

For businesses hoping to identify an avenue to quickly and definitively defeat the recent deluge of website accessibility claims brought by industrious plaintiff’s firms, advocacy groups, and government regulators in the ...