PANDEMIC FLU – WORKPLACE GUIDANCE

Posted on April 30, 2009 by admin

In response to a possible pandemic flu outbreak, we are adding critical resources to HR Made Simple to assist and guide you and your organization. In the event of a pandemic, organizations will play a key role in protecting employees health and safety. Here is an important resource available immediately:

Workplace Guidance from the U.S. Department of Labor – How Employers Can Protect Their Employees, Steps Employers Can Take To Reduce the Risk of Exposure, and more. http://www.osha.gov/Publications/influenza_pandemic.html

As always, we will be adding key resources to HR Made Simple as they become available to keep you current on information you need to protect your employees’ health and safety. To access these resources login to your HR Made Simple account, to learn more about the services offered through HRSentry, visit our products and services page.

Jury Duty Woes

Posted on April 20, 2009 by admin

No one likes jury duty, it takes time out of our already hectic lives and creates a mess of legal issues that get worse the longer your must serve. Employers must be diligent in how they react or risk facing costly lawsuits on a variety of issues. A federal court recently took up this issue in Madison v. District of Columbia.

In this case, a contract employee for the District of Columbia State Education Office(SEO) on a 13-month contract was called for jury duty toward the end of her employment. Up to that point she had received positive reviews and was expecting to have her contract renewed. Upon being called to jury duty for five-months, her boss split the workload up between several other workers. Working after hours and on Saturdays, the employee in question tried to take care of as much work as possible. After the jury duty was over, the employee was informed her contract would not be renewed.

In a write-up provided by hr.blr.com, The Court Said: There were two questions before the court: one, whether SEO refused to extend Cathy’s employment because of her 5-month jury service, and two, whether her status as a contract employee took her outside the protections of the Act.

On the first issue, Dr. Snopes(the Boss) had testified that Cathy’s job performance wasn’t very good, but the court found her testimony implausible because of the positive performance reviews. Snopes also said that Cathy’s jury duty had no bearing on the decision not to renew her contract, but the court found Cathy’s testimony more credible and found that she had been terminated because of her jury duty.

On the second issue, the court said nothing in the Act supported SEO’s argument that employees with non-permanent employment arrangements didn’t qualify for its protections. The court ordered SEO to reinstate Cathy, pay her back wages, restore her benefits, pay Cathy’s attorney’s fees and court costs, along with a $5,000 fine.

To help you as an employer out with this sensitive issue, HRSentry is providing a sample policy taken directly from our sample employee handbook. This policy addresses federal regulations, some states have additional requirements that can be accessed within our HR Made Simple libraries.

Sample jury duty policy:

XXX Company encourages you to fulfill your civic responsibilities by serving jury duty if you get a summons. You may request unpaid jury duty leave for the absence. You may also use any available paid time off benefits you have, such as vacation, to be paid for an unpaid jury duty leave.

If you get a jury duty summons, show it to your supervisor as soon as possible. This will help us plan for your possible absence from work. We expect you to come to work whenever the court schedule permits.

Either you or XXX Company may ask the court to excuse you from jury duty if necessary. We may ask that you be relieved from going on jury duty if we think your absence would cause serious operational problems for XXX Company.

Subject to the terms, conditions, and limitations of the applicable plans, XXX Company will continue to provide health insurance benefits for the full period of unpaid jury duty leave.

E-verify Battle Rages On

Posted on April 13, 2009 by admin

The hotly contested battle over the new e-verify immigration law has taken another step with a federal court overturning an Illinois ruling prohibiting organizations use of the system. E-verify is an Internet based system operated by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) in partnership with the Social Security Administration (SSA) that allows participating employers to electronically verify the employment eligibility of their newly hired employees. E-Verify, as described on the Department of Citizenship and Immigration Services, is a re-branding of its predecessor, the Basic Pilot/Employment Eligibility Verification Program, which has been in existence since 1997. The Basic Pilot is being re-branded to highlight key enhancements in the program, including a new Photo Screening Tool that helps employers to detect forged or faked immigration documents.

E-Verify works by allowing participating employers to electronically compare employee information taken from the Form I-9 (the paper-based employment eligibility verification form used for all new hires) against more than 425 million records in SSA’s database and more than 60 million records in DHS’ immigration databases. Results are returned within seconds.

Illinois argued that the system is not perfected yet and until it is, employers should not be using it. Currently when you submit a request, the system comes back with either verification or a “temporary nonconfirmation notice” (TNC). In the event of a nonconfirmation notice, the employee can pursue a secondary verification with the government to correct any mistakes. The government then has 10 days to issue a verification or a final nonconfirmation. Employers cannot terminate the employee in question until the final nonconfirmation is issued.

In its ruling, the federal court stated that Illinois violated the federal law that was created to be an option to all employers in America. To learn more about E-verify visit The USCIS or log into your HRSentry account and search for “e-verify”.

Fair Labor Standards Act Webinar

Posted on April 3, 2009 by admin

Free FLSA Webinar April 7th – On April 7th at 2p.m. HRSentry will be putting on a webinar on the Fair Labor Standards Act. The webinar will be presented by Brenda Sabin, covering how to handle work hours and the calculation of overtime as telecommuting and hand held devices become more commonplace. You will leave with a more complete understanding of the overtime laws as well as which hours actually count toward working hours in this age of emerging technology. Learn more here.