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Please Click HerePosted on May 15, 2014 by Ruder Ware Alumni
Several recent stories have talked about huge layoffs because of a loss of federal contracts and a decline in available work. Companies are looking at large layoffs to reduce costs and survive the cutbacks in revenue from the loss of contracts. A reduction in the workforce can open the door for age discrimination claims if […]
Posted on May 14, 2014 by Ruder Ware Alumni
Wisconsin has always been a little different because it required employers to keep a record of the hours worked by a professional employee who was exempt from the overtime pay requirements of the Fair Labor Standards Act. This requirement also applied to other exempt employees such as administrative or executive employees that were considered exempt […]
Posted on May 14, 2014 by Ruder Ware Alumni
Two recent events have refocused a concern about becoming a successor owner of a company in a setting where the company is being acquired/purchased. Situations arise on a regular basis where a company will purchase another business with the intention of operating the business as it has been previously operated and simply becoming the new […]
Posted on May 14, 2014 by Ruder Ware Alumni
A recent decision from the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati has opened the door to the argument that an employer must provide a reasonable accommodation of allowing an employee to work from home instead of being at the office. In this decision, the Court of Appeals held that an employer cannot automatically require […]
Posted on May 14, 2014 by Ruder Ware Alumni
Are employer-mandated anger-management counseling sessions considered compensable “hours worked” for purposes of the federal Fair Labor Standards Act? What if the employee attends anger-management counseling outside of his or her normal working hours? These questions came up recently during a roundtable meeting of an HR group of which I’m fortunate to be a part. Several […]
Posted on May 14, 2014 by Ruder Ware Alumni
The definition of misconduct under the Wisconsin Unemployment Compensation Law was changed as of the first of the year. We are now starting to see decisions under this new standard that limit employees from receiving unemployment benefits when being terminated from employment due to inappropriate conduct. For many years, an employer was not able to […]
Posted on May 14, 2014 by Ruder Ware Alumni
When an employee requests a leave of absence that may be for an FMLA-qualifying reason, his or her employer is required to provide notice to the employee of eligibility for leave under the FMLA (as most employers are aware, the Department of Labor has created a handy-dandy form to accomplish this purpose WH 381). The […]
Posted on April 11, 2014 by Sara J. Ackermann
On April 8, Gov. Scott Walker signed the Wisconsin Social Media Protection Act. Prudent Wisconsin employers should make sure to understand how this law affects both workplace and recruiting practices. With some exceptions, the Wisconsin Social Media Protection Act prohibits employers from requesting that employees provide passwords for (or any access to) an employee’s personal […]
Posted on January 27, 2014 by Sara J. Ackermann
Today the United States Supreme Court held that time spent “donning and doffing” protective clothing is not compensable under the Fair Labor Standards Act. In Sandifer v. United States Steel Corp, Sandifer and other steelworkers filed a putative collective action under the Fair Labor Standards Act (the Act), seeking back pay for time spent donning […]
Posted on October 31, 2013 by Ruder Ware Alumni
The maximum penalty imposed on employers for safety violations in worker’s compensation is $15,000. Seldom does a safety violation case make its way through a hearing before an administrative law judge, to appeal to the Labor and Industry Review commission, to a circuit court appeal, and then finally to the Wisconsin Court of Appeals. The […]