A state court judge in Pennsylvania has come up with a new way to afford litigants access to social media as part of discovery in a pending civil action. Daniel Cummins at Tort Talk has the details: The Judge’s page long Order does not provide the background on the case…
In Pennsylvania, as in most states, an employee without a contract for a specific term of employment is deemed an at-will employee. Subject to certain exceptions (e.g., discrimination, violations of public policy), an at-will employee can be terminated for any reason or no reason at all. How hard is it…
I’ve been slacking, folks. Not since November have I blogged about a defendant’s motion to compel a motion to compel an individual’s social-media content. Since then, several more Pennsylvania courts have weighed in on this burgeoning area. I’m sorry to each and every one of you. I have let…
Starting this year, employees who receive severance pay in excess of 40% of the average annual wage in Pennsylvania will have their unemployment compensation benefits offset. Currently, that 40% number is $17,853.00. As Jonathan Segal, Legislative Director for PA State Council of SHRM, notes here, employers should be very careful…
As the year draws to a close, let’s take a look back at the most popular posts at The Employer Handbook in 2011, based on number of hits: 5. Social media and the workplace. School teacher Natalie Munroe made several appearances on the blog this year. Remember her? She…
What is this? A broken record? Yesterday, I blogged about a recent NY appellate decision in which the court held that an employee who had sued her employer would have have to turn over her Facebook postings that related to the case. Today, we head south down 95, and then…
An eligible employee may take up to 12 workweeks of leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act in a 12-month period. If an employee exhausts all of her FMLA leave and fails to return to work after the 12 weeks are up, can’t the company simply fire the employee?…
Earlier this year, a local teacher was suspended after her school learned about nasty comments on her personal blog concerning her students. And that story became national news. More on the history here, here, and here. Now, word has it that the school is considering a social-media policy. Well, it’s…
With so many employment laws out there, it’s not easy to keep track of what those laws say — let alone under which of them your business may be covered. Well, who loves ya! After the jump, it’s employment laws by the numbers — number of employees that is —…
Yesterday afternoon, in a letter to City Council, Mayor Michael Nutter vetoed the “Promoting Healthy Families and Workplaces” bill. This bill, discussed in a previous blog post, would have required businesses to provide paid sick leave to employees who work a minimum number of hours in Philadelphia County. On June 16,…