Articles Posted in Wages and Hours

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Linh Nguyen Dallas Trial Attorney

If you’ve worked in the food service industry before, you know that the holidays can be hit-or-miss when it comes to tips. I spent years in the industry at a variety of different food establishments, working through many Thanksgivings, Christmases, and New Years. I would hope on these days that it would be like any other when I could expect to bring home the usual amount of tips from the night. If I got lucky, someone would be in high holiday spirits and extra generous; and if I was unlucky, someone would think leaving me a Christmas card made up for the $0.00 left on the “tip” line of the receipt (totally happened, and they didn’t even leave a message inside!).

But, of course, that’s the luck of the draw when it comes to the food service industry and being a tipped worker. There’s a lot that can be said about what needs to be changed or fixed in the industry, and you likely have your own opinions on whether tipping should even be a thing. However, this blog today is for my tipped workers who may not know all the laws surrounding what your employer can or can’t do with the tips you earned.

FFAD29BD-DCBE-46B6-9955-05B9B7DCBA83-200x300Have you heard it’s “taboo” to talk about your salary? Us too. Well, that is out the window now. Welcome to the era of salary transparency. Yes, we know it can be awkward to talk about salary, but with new laws on the horizon, it may be a little easier to figure out how much your co-workers are getting paid. 

 Recently, the New York City Council passed a law requiring employers in New York City with four or more employees to list the minimum and maximum salary on all job posting including ads, promotions, and transfer opportunities. This law applies to any position that can or will be performed, in whole or in part, in New York City. This affects remote listings, meaning any job that could conceivably be done in New York City must follow this. 

 So why did the New York City Council deem this necessary? They passed this law to try and fight against big pay gaps, specifically between genders as well as between majority and minority racial groups. Let’s be honest, pay matters. It affects where you work and how long you decide to stay there.  

Austin Campbell

Dallas Employment Trial Lawyer Austin Campbell

Summary: This article gives an overview of the May 2022 Texas Supreme Court decision Perthuis v. Baylor Miraca Genetics Laboratories, LLC, and its implications for employees’ rights to their commissions in Texas. 

Under Texas law, if you are an employee who is paid via commission, as long as you fully performed what you were required to do under your commission plan at the time, you are owed the commissions for your work.  Furthermore, written commission plans can only be modified in writing.  Employers can modify their commission plans prospectively, i.e., going forward.  But employers cannot escape their obligation to pay commissions already earned by changing the plan.  

Austin Campbell

Texas Employment Lawyer Austin Campbell

Summary: This article gives a brief overview of the problems that the “manager rule” can cause high-level employees trying to raise concerns about pay issues, as well as the limits of that rule.

Categories: At-will; Wrongful termination; Retaliation Claims; Fair Pay; Wage and Hour; Tipped Employees     

Austin Campbell

Austin Campbell

Wage theft—when employers fail to pay their employees the amounts they are legally required to for the work their employees perform—is by some estimates more common than all forms of robbery combined. Ross Eisenbrey, Wage Theft Is a Bigger Problem than Other Theft – But Not Enough Is Done to Protect Workers, Econ. Pol’y Inst. (Apr. 2, 2014), available at http://www.epi.org/publication/wage-theft-bigger-problem-theft-protect [https://perma.cc/E6FY-F992]. A significant part of that is unpaid overtime in violation of the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”).

Given the magnitude of the problem and the limited resources of the U.S. Department of Labor, the burden is often on you as the employee to sue and prove that you are owed overtime pay, as well as how much you are owed. The FLSA requires employers to keep records of employees’ wages and hours, but does not allow an employee to sue employer just for failing to keep proper records. Thus, often—especially in situations where your employer is illegally treating you as a salaried employee to avoid paying you overtime altogether—you can have a hard time even figuring out what you are actually owed.

deontae-wherryOver the last month, I have noticed an increase in the number of salaried employees who have become concerned about their paycheck. Some salaried employees have found themselves mandated to reduce their work to less than forty hours per week, and as a result to account for the reduction, their employers have threatened to reduce their pay. Conversely, other salaried employees have found themselves working significantly more than their traditional forty-hour work week as a result of the high COVID demands in their particular industry. However, some companies are not compensating employees for the extra hours worked – can they do that? Well, the answer is, it depends.

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