The July 17, 2019, Recommended Decision and Order of a Department of Labor Administrative Law Judge in OFCCP v. Enterprise RAC Company of Baltimore, LLC, Case No.: 2016-OFC-00006 had three special messages which I believe are worth reinforcing to federal government contractors with affirmative action plan (AAP) obligations. The case itself was brought by the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs against the operations of Enterprise car rental company based in Maryland. (That is, the…

The headline of the article read, “JetBlue Made Worker Expose Breasts For Drug Test, Says Suit.”   Before discussing this case, three preliminary disclaimers are in order.  First, the  underlying article and this post are based solely upon the plaintiff’s allegations in a recently-filed lawsuit.  The article is not a recitation of facts as found by a court after a trial on the evidence, or even undisputed facts as determined by a court in response to…

Under the Fair Labor Standards Act’s tip credit rules, employers can pay a base hourly wage as low as $2.13/hour to employees who customarily and regularly receive at least $30/month in tips directly from customers.  (Iowa law requires a minimum base hourly wage of $4.35/hour to this type of tipped employee.)  Under both the Federal and Iowa statutes, employers must guarantee employees at least $7.25/hour (the federal and Iowa minimum wage) through a combination of…

Cybersecurity incidents routinely grab headlines, and for good reason. These incidents often lead to exposure of large volumes of sensitive data, or significant monetary losses. For example, this blog previously discussed how fraudster access to online banking platforms could lead to lawsuits between banks and customers over who is ultimately liable for unauthorized transfers. There is no doubt that the internet has made it easier for fraudsters to target organizations from afar. However, even though…

On April 1, 2019, the Department of Labor announced a Notice of Proposed Rule Making (NPRM) for Part 791 of Title 29 of the Code of Federal Regulations for the Fair Labor Standards Act that will “ revise and clarify the responsibilities of employers and joint employers to employees in joint employer arrangements”.  This regulation had not been meaningfully revised since 1958. The DOL has been busy, indeed.  This NPRM joins two others that…

On March 28, the U.S. Department of Labor announced a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) to clarify and amend the agency rules regarding the regular rate provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act that have not been comprehensively revised in more than 50 years.  Yesterday’s announcement was expected, per previous posts on this blog (11/2/18 & 2/5/19).  The DOL states that the proposal will: clarify and better define the regular rate for today’s workplace…

Part 1 of this blog post, discussed a decision of a Canadian provincial supreme court affirming an arbitrator’s decision that the medially- authorized use of medical cannabis created a risk of the employee’s impairment on the jobsite. In that case, the employer was determined to not have the “reasonable accommodation” of giving an employee who was medically using marijuana a safety-sensitive job because the employer was not able to readily measure impairment from cannabis…