Wages

Your hard-earned wages are your property. They belong to you. I’m not just saying this as a matter of principal, it is actually the law. In fact, an employer’s failure to pay an employee’s full wages for all of their work in a timely manner has a name: wage theft. Some acts that are considered wage theft include: Paying below minimum wage. Employers are required to pay the highest minimum wage available to an employee, whether it is the Federal minimum wage, the state minimum wage, or the locally adopted minimum wage. Improperly withholding tips, commissions, or bonuses. These are all property of the employee once earned. Failing to properly account for employees’ work hours. The failure to maintain accurate timesheets, or procedures that result in employee or employers underreporting an employee’s time mean that the employee is underpaid. Compelling an employee to work “off the clock”. This is highly illegal and violates the fundamental…Read More

Cheesecake Factory is a popular restaurant, with its diverse and crowd-pleasing menu, big portions, delicious desserts, clean atmosphere, and fancy-looking furnishings. Regardless of what day of the week you go, there always seems to be a line to get a table. Unfortunately, Cheesecake Factory just made the news for all the wrong reasons. That’s because the California Labor Commission just found the company liable for $4.5 million for wage and overtime violations. Janitors Got Ripped Off The underlying violations here involve janitors who clean and maintain the Cheesecake Factory, who complained that for the last three years, they were being paid below minimum wage, were working far longer than 8 hours a day and 40 hours a week yet were not getting paid overtime, were denied rest breaks, and in some cases were forced to work off the clock. Basically every wage and overtime violation you can imagine. These janitors were subcontracted through a cleaning-services…Read More

Terminix International is one of the biggest pest control companies in the entire world. With a presence in almost every state in the country and in many countries around the world, the company employs over 8000 people and has staggering revenues that far exceed a billion dollars a year. Unfortunately, there is a growing possibility that the company has been cutting corners to achieve this level of success. If you work for Terminix as a Pest Control Technician, you’re well aware that you are expected to very long hours. In fact, you likely work more than 40 hours per week on a regular basis. In the realm of wage and overtime rights, employees are generally entitled to overtime pay when it comes to hours worked beyond 40 hours in a work week. This is 1.5 times an employee’s regular rate of pay for each hour over eight hours in a workday, and double pay if…Read More

It’s no secret that wage gaps exist between genders and races. Closing that gap seems to have stalled since the 1980s. Women earn 79 cents to every dollar earned by men, on average. And for black and Hispanic women it is even lower at 64 and 55 cents. Why do these wage disparities still exist and what can be done about them? Also, if we know they exist, how come there aren’t more class action lawsuits for wage discrimination? The Justification For Wage Disparity Not all wage gaps are a result of discrimination. Some are legitimate, based on seniority, years of experience, education and experience with a competitor. But if those disparities in salary cannot be explained by those factors, they may be violations of equal pay laws – even if they are unintentional. Unfortunately, systemic wage gaps by gender or race often go undetected. Workers in our culture do not talk about their salaries or what…Read More

You work hard for your bonus. You keep track of every performance measure that your employer sets for you and you do your best to hit those marks. You do so relying on that promised bonus. So what happens if you are not paid your bonus, or it doesn’t come when it is supposed to? Do you simply throw up your hands because it was “extra” money? To answer that question, it is important to understand how California labor laws treat bonuses. Types Of Bonuses California law views bonuses in two categories, “discretionary” and “non-discretionary” bonuses. These are also referred to as “unearned” and “earned” bonuses. Discretionary bonuses are “sums paid as gifts at a holiday or other special occasions, such as a reward for good service, which are not measured by or dependent upon hours worked, production or efficiency, are not included for purposes of determining the regular rate of pay.” An example is…Read More

When you quit a job, things can get very bad, very quickly. Whether you were planning to quit or simply could not take it and impulsively quit, losing your primary source of income hits hard. It likely means that you will struggle or fail to pay rent, a car payment, car insurance, a phone bill, utilities, or credit cards bills. That is why your final paycheck from your employer is so important, because it is that last influx of money to tide you until you find another job. Fortunately, California has some of the most employee friendly laws when it comes to final pay. These laws establish strict and swift timeframes in which an employer must deliver a final pay check to an employee who quits. Calendar mark with Quit job Did The Employee Give Notice? The speed with which an employee gets their final paycheck depends on whether they provided their employer at least…Read More

Wage disparities between genders can be found in all types of industries. Certain fields, such as technology, the problem is much more widespread. In recent years, several companies in the Silicon Valley, such as Microsoft, Facebook and Oracle, have been thrust in the spotlight for wage gap issues. And recently, Google has been under investigation by the Department of Labor (DOL) for gender pay discrimination. As a federal contractor, Google is required to provide the DOL with access to its records and employee information to ensure compliance with federal equal opportunity laws. In this investigation, the DOL found evidence of extreme gender pay discrimination. They filed a lawsuit against Google this past January. “We found systemic compensation disparities against women pretty much across the entire workforce,” said Janette Wipper, a DOL regional director. Janet Herold, regional solicitor for the DOL, said: “The government’s analysis at this point indicates that discrimination against women in Google is quite extreme,…Read More

$10.50 per hour is the minimum wage in California. Remember that number. Because if a potential employer is trying to convince you to take less than this amount, you are being deceived. Employers in California are subject to both federal and state employee wage laws. The federal government mandates compliance with the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), while California is governed by the California Labor Code. Minimum wage words showing through magnifying glass held by hand According to the FLSA and current U.S. regulations, the federal minimum wage is currently $7.25. In contrast, the California Labor Code Section 1182.12 has established an annually increasing state minimum wage for employers with more than 26 employees. Beginning January 1, 2017 through the end of this year, the state minimum wage is $10.50 per hour. $10.50 per hour is clearly more than $7.25 per hour, so how do we reconcile that difference? Fortunately, the laws in California favor…Read More

Vacations are part of the American experience. If you think about it, we start getting vacations in daycare, in elementary school, and through our entire educational experience. So the concept is engrained in the structure of our lives. So when we enter the workforce, we consider it a given that vacation will be a part of the equation. Unfortunately, this isn’t the case for everyone. Vacation time, or Paid Time Off (PTO) is not actually a legal requirement of employers. In other words, with all of the protections afforded employees in California, employers are under no legal obligation to offer PTO. Despite this, many companies do offer PTO, because it would be difficult to stay competitive and attract talented employees without some sort of vacation policy. If an employer has a PTO policy for its employees, it then becomes subject to certain labor laws governing how it treats and pays vacation time. Some significant regulations…Read More

When you go to work at your job, you do so with the expectation of getting paid. Not only is this is the civic contract between an employer and an employee, but it is well-settled law. Unfortunately, as the attorneys at Moss Bollinger have seen many times, some employers either don’t have their business in order or choose to play games with their employees when it comes to payment. One of these scenarios is when employers pay employees late. Employers Must Establish Paydays The state of California requires that employers establish two paydays per month. An employee’s wages from the first two weeks of the month, must be paid no later than the 26th of the month. Wages earned for the rest of the month must be paid by the 10th of the next month. Not only is it the law that California employers must establish paydays, but it must also clearly notify its employees…Read More