Image Credit: Pexels.com (https://www.pexels.com/photo/facebook-glasses-privacy-privacy-policy-267372/) Asking for a friend, of course. A bunch of your employees just resigned, set up a competing venture, plundered a bunch of your trade secrets, and have begun contacting your customers. But, hold up! Your IT administrator examined their company laptops and struck gold! He reviewed…
Image Credit: http://www.freestockphotos.biz/stockphoto/14050 (nicubunu acquired from OCAL (Website)) On most days, I blog for you, my readers, to educate you on new legal issues and to keep you ahead of the HR-compliance curve. This is not most days. Tuesday, December 4 will be one of those days. If you haven’t…
By Chris Potter (Flickr: 3D Judges Gavel) [CC BY 2.0 ], via Wikimedia CommonsYesterday, I blogged here about the most important employment law decision of 2018. It’s a case called Minarsky v. Susquehanna County (opinion here). If you missed my post, well, it was long. 1,888 words long. So, here’s the super-condensed version:…
By Wolfmann [CC BY-SA 4.0 ], from Wikimedia Commons Minarsky v. Susquehanna County (opinion here) is a sexual harassment case. And there’s a lot to discuss. But the biggest takeaway is that any subsequent employer-defendant asserting a Faragher/Ellerth defense in the Third Circuit will find it very difficult to obtain summary…
You know, I don’t think we’ve ever discussed the False Claims Act here at The Employer Handbook. I don’t think we’ve discussed crowded clown cars either. And, while clowns may pique more interest, alas, this is an employment-law blog. So, I suppose we’ll enjoy our first taste of FCA together.…
Yep, Harry Potter. On Friday, the Third Circuit of Appeals issued a precedential Fair Labor Standards Act opinion. The issue was whether the FLSA requires employers to compensate employees for breaks of 20 minutes or less after they log off their computers and are free from any work duties. I…
If an employer violates the Fair Labor Standards Act, like by not paying overtime, the plaintiff(s) can generally recover two years of unpaid overtime for the two years preceding the lawsuit. Those plaintiffs may also recover liquidated damages equal to the unpaid overtime. So, if an employer owes $100 in…
Serendipity may be one of the worst movies of all time. Of this, I am sure. Then again, I can’t stand John Cusack movies, especially that pretentious piece of one-know-what, High Fidelity. But, I’m not writing today to bash John Cusack. And, I’m not made of stone. Hot Tub Time Machine was…
Ready, fire, aim. That’s the approach that many employers take when seeking to enforce a covenant not to compete with a former employee. Ready, fire, aim. When there’s a even a whisper that a former employee has gone to work for a competitor, the former employer often rushes into court,…
You’ll have to pardon the headline. I’m not nearly as articulate as the Third Circuit was in yesterday’s opinion in Karlo v. Pittsburgh Glass Works, LLC, using words like “cognizable” and “disproportionate adverse impact.” And, even though the Third Circuit sits in Philadelphia, you won’t find local lingo like “old…