The Majority of Colorado Businesses Not Verifying Employees Eligibility
Colorado businesses has a responsibility to verify employees eligibility. More than half of Colorado businesses have failed to comply with a state law that requires them to verify that new employees are in the country legally, according to an audit released earlier this week.
Auditors found that the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment is not doing enough to assure compliance with the law, adopted during a 2006 special session of the General Assembly focusing on illegal immigration.
W. Garnett & Associates
Human Capital Management
1-303-658-9342
What Role Should Employers Play About Sexual Harassment in the Workplace
Sexual harassment awareness in the workplace plays a critical role. Sexual harassment in the workplace has long been illegal. Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of1964 classifies sexual harassment as discrimination. The specific definition is “unwelcome verbal, visual, or physical conduct of a sexual nature that is severe or pervasive and affects working conditions or creates a hostile work environment.”
W. Garnett & Associates
Human Capital Management
1-303-658-9342
Employee Misclassification has the Department of Labor Teaming With the IRS
Because of employee misclassification the Department of Labor and the IRS find the need to collaborate. Independent contractors are ineligible for minimum wage and overtime pay, unemployment insurance, workers’ compensation and social security benefits. And, the government does not collect employment taxes on compensation paid to independent contractors. Therefore, if an employee is misclassified as an independent contractor, he or she loses out on valuable protections and the government loses out on substantial tax revenues.
W. Garnett & Associates
Human Capital Management
1-303-658-9342
Do You Know How to Protect your Business From Workplace Retaliation Claims?
Workplace Retaliation Claims can be extremely expensive to the organization if not handled correctly. “We are certainly seeing an uptick in retaliation claims filed by current and former employees,” says Nicole Gray, an attorney in the Labor and Employment Practice Group at McDonald Hopkins. “Recent decisions by the U.S. Supreme Court that have expanded the rights of employees who complain about retaliation, energetic enforcement by federal agencies, and increased public awareness are all factors that could explain why retaliation claims are becoming more frequent.”
W. Garnett & Associates
Human Capital Management
1-303-658-9342
How to avoid FLSA Class Action Lawsuits
Does your organization know the difference between the employee classifications? Many companies don’t understand when to properly classify employees as exempt versus non-exempt, and consequently whether to pay overtime. Most think all you have to do to avoid paying overtime is make an agreement with the employee to pay them on a salary basis. While a salary basis test is part of the requirement to make an employee exempt from overtime, that is just a small part of the analysis. Startups are particularly susceptible to this, as staffing is constantly in flux, employees work long hours, and entrepreneurs are still learning the ropes as they go.
W. Garnett & Associates
Human Capital Management
1-303-658-9342
What Role are you Asking your HR Department to Play?
Companies Be aware of Mistakes That Make Compliance Efforts Fail
The federal government plays a tremendous role in how a business must operate so be aware. For as much time and effort is spent at most enterprise and government organizations in complying with regulatory and standards body mandates, an awful lot of security firms can’t seem to get compliance right. A study earlier this year showed that half of organizations have failed an audit, and 75 percent were not sure they’d pass their audits in the future.
W. Garnett & Associates
Human Capital Management
1-303-658-9342
Fair Labor Standard Act Hits a Texas Restaurant with Fines
FLSA is an area of employment that every business has to understand for compliance sake. According to a U.S. Department of Labor press release, Darden Restaurants Inc., doing business as Red Lobster in Lubbock, has agreed to pay $27,427 in back wages after an investigation by the U.S. DOL’s Wage and Hour Division found that 109 current and former servers were not properly paid as required by the Fair Labor Standards Act. The company also has been assessed $23,980 in civil money penalties to be paid to the government. Red Lobster in Lubbock is a full-service restaurant, employing approximately 82 workers.
W. Garnett & Associates
Human Capital Management
1-303-658-9342
Review the Tips For Dealing With Workplace Discrimination
If your organization has not been trained in the areas of Title VII, beware. If a situation occurs that you think constitutes inequality, talk with your company’s human resources department and see what they would advise you to do. If your company doesn’t have a human resources department, talk with your supervisor. If your supervisor is the one who has committed the infraction, go to your supervisor’s supervisor. If there isn’t anyone who can help you to resolve the situation that you are in, it’s time to pull out the experts and hire a lawyer.
W. Garnett & Associates
Human Capital Management
1-303-658-9342
ICE Checking Records for Hiring of Illegal Immigrants
2011 offers another round of Form I-9 Audits by Immigration Custom Enforcement or ICE. While reaffirming that the audits are intended to foster a culture of compliance among potential employers of illegal immigrants, the agency noted that this is the fifth such audit program. In the fiscal year 2010 ICE arrested 196 employers from 2,338 audits. The 2,196 audits of the preceding 2009 fiscal year resulted in 114 employer arrests.
W. Garnett & Associates
Human Capital Management
1-303-658-9342
