Orange County Employment Lawyers Blog

Los Angeles Employment Law FAQ for Holiday Workers

November 25, 2020 | by Nassiri Law

As we enter into the holiday season (no matter how different it may look this year than in year’s past), our Los Angeles employment lawyers decided this was a good time to review employer obligations for holiday pay, hours, time off requests and more.

The following are frequently asked questions pertaining to holiday work:

Is my employer required to give me time off for the holidays if I ask? Not in California. The only exception is a religious holiday accommodation (more on that later). Any time that you work on the weekend or a holiday will be treated the same as if you were working any other day. As noted by the California Department of Industrial Relations, your employer is under no obligation to give you paid holidays (though depending on the type of business, many do as an employment perk). Furthermore, your employer is not required to close its business on any holiday (though many do for select holidays, like Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Eve and/or New Year’s Day). Continue Reading ›

Court: California Retail Workers Must Be Paid for Bag Check Wait Times After Shifts

November 22, 2020 | by Nassiri Law

After nearly a decade of legal battles, employees for Apple received a ruling in their favor when the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit held that California’s minimum wage law entitles them to be paid for the time they spend waiting to be searched and being searched when they leave the retail store.

Our Los Angeles employment attorneys recognize this case could have far-reaching implications for employees in retail and other industries.

The class action case, Frliken et. al. v. Apple Inc., covers retail workers for Apple Inc. and was first filed in 2009. Key to the appellate court’s decision was the fact that Apple has a policy that requires employees who carry bags to work to undergo package and bag searches by supervisors or security staff at the end of each shift as a loss prevention method. Such actions are legal (so long as they aren’t applied in a way that is discriminatory) but employees can’t be expected to wait for and undergo these searches on their own time/at their own expense, the court ruled. Continue Reading ›

Most Americans Believe LGBTQ Workers Should Be Federally Protected

November 15, 2020 | by Nassiri Law

Issues pertaining to the legal workplace protections of LGBTQ workers are going to be entering the domain of the U.S. Supreme Court in the next several years. The good news is that most Americans believe LGBTQ workplace should be unlawful. However, at the time the annual GLAAD 2020 Acceptance Acceleration study was conducted earlier this year, most respondents didn’t realize it was still legal at the federal level.

The good news is a landmark ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court has turned the tide decisively in the favor of LGBTQ rights. However, with a new conservative-leaning bend to the SCOTUS, it’s unclear what we can expect in future LGBTQ discrimination challenges.

Californians live in one of 23 states that have their own non-discrimination protections (under the California Fair Housing and Employment Act). But residents and workers in 27 other states lacked such protections formally.

As longtime advocates and allies for LGBTQ rights in the workplace, our Los Angeles employment lawyers think perhaps part of the dissonance between the majority of Americans who agree these rights are important yet didn’t know they existed (yet) is the notion that the SCOTUS ruling on marriage equality was somehow the finish line. In reality, we’ve still got farther to go. Continue Reading ›

Study: Workers who Report Sexual Harassment Likely Targets of Retaliation

November 8, 2020 | by Nassiri Law

A new comprehensive analysis conducted by the National Women’s Law Center and the Time’s Up Legal Defense Fund shines a light on several difficult truths about workplace sexual harassment. Key among those: More than 7 in 10 survivors of workplace sexual harassment (nearly three-quarters) suffer some type of retaliation. This aligns with EEOC sexual harassment claims data indicating 72 percent of employees reporting sexual harassment also report retaliation.

As our Los Angeles sexual harassment attorneys can explain, retaliation can include:

Denial of promotions.
Transfer to a less desirable location or assignment with more burdensome tasks.
Receiving harsher treatment from supervisors.
Wrongful termination.
Civil litigation for defamation.

Of those who reported sexual harassment and were retaliated against, more than one-third were terminated. One-fifth had their work or behavior heavily scrutinized or were given bad performance reviews.

The report, called “Coming Forward,” looked at more than 3,300 online requests for legal services nearly three years into the #MeToo movement. It reveals that even as awareness of sexual harassment at work has increased, many victims are still at a distinct disadvantage. Continue Reading ›

California Employment Lawsuit Filed by Man With TBI Alleges Discrimination, Wrongful Termination

November 2, 2020 | by Nassiri Law

A California employment lawsuit filed against the retailer Target alleges the company discriminated and retaliated against an employee with a traumatic brain injury (TBI) before wrongly firing him.

According to the local CBS News affiliate in Los Angeles, plaintiff suffered from a brain injury, which he reportedly disclosed during the interview process. Despite this, his employer failed to provide him with reasonable accommodations. Instead, his supervisor constantly criticized his slow speed in comparison to other workers. He also alleges he was not properly trained with regard to job duties and expectations. He was reportedly harassed by his supervisor, and said the company failed to take action and later retaliated by firing him for being “full of excuses of why you are a slow performer.”

The worker is seeking unspecified compensatory and punitive damages. Continue Reading ›

The Pandemic’s Potential to Increase California Employment Lawsuits

October 28, 2020 | by Nassiri Law

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant impact on workplaces across the country. Non-essential businesses were shuttered for weeks or months, workplace policies changed and many employers and employees alike have been affected somehow.

California employment lawsuits were prevalent enough even in better times, but the pandemic is what we call a “workplace agitator.” It’s something that impacts a wide swath of people in a negative way, contributing to the kind of economic and personal stress that can heighten underlying workplace tensions.

It’s no surprise then that many Los Angeles employment attorneys are noting an uptick in employment-related claims, especially because there may be newly-acquired legal rights or requirements that employers may potentially violate.

New California Labor Law Gives Workers Better Family Leave Protections

October 21, 2020 | by Nassiri Law

A new law California bill recently signed into law will provide millions of workers employed by small businesses additional family leave protections that can be used for time off to care for a family member who is sick or new baby.

SB 1383 requires companies employing five workers or more to extend a full three months of family leave (unpaid) to workers – starting Jan. 1, 2021. As it stands, the only employees who can expect to take the full three months of family leave are those working for a company with 50 or more employees. New parents can take parental leave if they are employed by a company with at least 20 employees. But many families couldn’t access these job protections or the state’s family leave benefits program, into which all workers pay. The state benefits grant up to eight weeks of partial pay (recently raised from six weeks) based on a worker’s weekly salary.

Furthermore, the new law allows new parents employed by the same company to each by given the full 12 weeks of leave – rather than giving employers the option to compel parents to split their leave time. Continue Reading ›

Examining California Rest Break Laws for Agricultural Workers

October 14, 2020 | by Nassiri Law

All employees in California – including agricultural workers – are protected by certain rights under California’s labor laws, which include the right to minimum wages, meal and rest breaks and heat recovery breaks. There are more than 70,000 farms statewide spanning nearly 25 million acres of land. But these workers, more than 400,000 of whom in California were considered essential to our economic and practical sustainability through the pandemic, remain vulnerable.

Recently, farmworkers in a San Joaquin County labor lawsuit were compensated for rest breaks that were not paid. However, the California appellate court would not allow them recovery under two separate statutes. Continue Reading ›

Transgender Man Files Pregnancy Discrimination Lawsuit

October 10, 2020 | by Nassiri Law

California law protects both transgender and pregnant workers, but rarely do employment law cases combine the two. Recently in New Jersey, a transgender man filed an employment lawsuit against Amazon alleging he was harassed and turned down for a promotion after revealing his pregnancy to his employer.

According to NBC News, the man informed his boss about the pregnancy in the summer of last year. His boss disclosed this information to other managers, and word spread throughout the facility. Soon, other warehouse workers were bullying and harassing him about using the men’s bathroom. Suddenly, his work performance came under fire. He was placed on paid leave after complaining to human resources. When he returned, he learned he’d been demoted to a position of “item picker,” which required him to lift heavy items on a routine basis. At that point, he told HR that the weight lifting requirements were causing him pain in his abdomen. Again, he was placed on paid leave and told to acquire a doctor’s recommendation for pregnancy-related accommodations. He did so, he said, but was denied.

He was then offered a promotion at a different facility – one that would have granted him a reprieve from the people harassing him – but that was later rescinded and he was fired. His termination came the same month he was to give birth. He now alleges gender discrimination and pregnancy discrimination, and is seeking recovery of lost wages and benefits as well as coverage of legal fees and punitive damages. Continue Reading ›

California Wage Theft Lawsuit Costs McDonald’s $26 Million

October 7, 2020 | by Nassiri Law

Tens of thousands of California fast-food workers at corporate-owned McDonald’s restaurants in California will be getting a cut of the $26 million class action lawsuit over years-old allegations of wage theft.

On average, each employee can expect to receive about $330, though some may have as much as $4,000 coming to them.

Business Insider reports the lawsuit was first filed seven years ago, with the corporation accused of engaging in numerous illegal practices to scam workers of fair wages, including:

Not paying all wages when they were due.
Not providing rest and meal breaks for workers.
Not paying overtime wages.
Not paying minimum wages.