Posts from December 2009.
Blogs
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    As 2009 winds to a close, we can look backward, we can look forward, or we can do both.
    For now, let's just look forward with an eye toward what California employers can expect in 2010 as it relates to wage-hour law.
    A warning, though:  nothing on the horizon should hearten California employers.  
 
1)  Clarification of Meal and Rest Break Obligations
    Sometime in 2010 -- likely within the first quarter -- California employers should finally receive an answer from the California Supreme Court to a lingering question about meal and rest breaks:  does the ...
Blogs
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By Amy J. Traub

On December 16, 2009, Judge Laura Taylor Swain of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York granted summary judgment to Starbucks Corp. (“Starbucks”) in a wage/hour lawsuit filed by former and current baristas of Starbucks’s coffee shops located in New York.

In their lawsuit, filed in April 2008, the New York baristas argued that Starbucks had violated state wage and hour laws by splitting tips intended for baristas with shift supervisors, handing out tips on a weekly basis instead of on a per-shift basis, and failing to distribute tips ...

Blogs
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It is that time of the year when most companies start thinking about handing out year end or Christmas bonuses to their employees.  For exempt workers, such payments are not a concern.  For non-exempt workers, however, bonus payments raise the prospect of adding to the employee's regular rate, which could result in additional overtime liability.  For example, if an employee works overtime in the week he receives a bonus check of $400.00, the Department of Labor may require the bonus to be included in the "regular rate" upon which the time and one half overtime calculation is based (i.e ...

Blogs
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by Betsy Johnson

On November 23, 2009, the Chief Counsel of the California Division of Labor Standards Enforcement ("DLSE") issued an Opinion Letter on behalf of the Labor Commissioner, Angela Bradstreet, in which the DLSE modified its enforcement stance on the issue of making deductions from exempt employee accrued vacation to cover partial-day absences. In the Opinion Letter, the DLSE opined that there is nothing in California law that would prevent an employer from implementing a policy that provides for hour-for-hour deductions from accrued vacation leave for partial-day ...

Blogs
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By Bill Milani, Jeff Landes, Susan Gross Sholinsky and Anna Cohen

We previously advised that the New York State Department of Labor ("DOL") had taken the stance that in order to comply with Section 195(1) of the New York State Labor Law (i.e., to provide proper notice to employees of their wages, overtime rates (if applicable) and paydays), employers would be required to utilize the DOL's official forms, which could be accessed at the DOL's Web site.

The DOL has now decided that, while employers may still elect to utilize the DOL's forms, employers need not utilize the DOL's forms in order ...

Blogs
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Often, employers ask their outside labor counsel to review job descriptions or other material to provide an opinion on whether a job, or group of jobs, should be classified as exempt from overtime requirements.  Such efforts would seemingly be a classic example of a privileged attorney client communication made for the purpose of providing legal advice.

In a recent case out of California state court, however, this answer was not so clear at the trial and appellate level, who both required the employer to hand over a redacted version of such a letter in a class action overtime suit.  The ...

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