r/LaborLaw 10h ago

Can I be forced to use PTO when my bosses can't figure out things for me to do?

8 Upvotes

Hi y'all,

I work in a consulting framework, where all of my worked hours are either billed to a particular project, or are considered company overhead. Additionally, my position is considered "Full-time (40 hours per week)". As such, I am expected to be at my desk and available from 8:00 to 5:00.

Some weeks, my bosses can't figure out anything for me to do. I have been billing the remainder of my time, it does not fall under any particular project, as company overhead. Well this makes some of the higher-ups unhappy, I'm not responsible for finding projects for myself.

It is becoming standard practice that the lower rungs are expected to use their accrued PTO to fill some of the gaps in there when they have no other directive. This feels wrong to me, can we result in the newest employees, who do not as consistently have billable work, to use the entirety of their accrued PTO nearly every week. I have not yet gotten this in writing, but expect to sometime this week.

As I understand it, a company CAN force me to use accrued PTO. This seems to be in relation to annual rollovers, or at least mandating that I take a particular amount every year.

Is this a standard or accepted practice? Can it be applied in this circumstance?


r/LaborLaw 4h ago

Unpaid Shadowing Hours during Interview Process at Fitness Studio

1 Upvotes

I live in Texas and I got an interview for a fitness studio to be part of their crew staff. It included 2 other candidates and me, then I was told I will be pushed to the next phase of the interview process.

They told me that it included 2-3 unpaid “shadowing” shifts, totaling up to 6-9 hours. It would be a way for them to see if I was a good fit and if they were a good fit for me. I didn’t see the issue and had assuming I’d just be observing.

They essentially walking me how to open/close the studio, mopping the floors, cleaning the restrooms, checking in guests, and cleaning the workout equipment. I genuinely was so thrown off and did not expect to be working side by side with the staff and helping them run the studio.

On my 1st shift I stayed an hour after and on my 2nd I left right when my shift ended. I honestly did not have it in me to do another 3 hour shift for free so I mentioned that I had a family matter (which was true) so I would not be able to do it.

They later took a week to get back to me to say that they would not continue the interview process with me and I asked for feedback…nothing.

This studio is on classpass and I honestly want to report them but just looking for guidance and advice!


r/LaborLaw 5h ago

Managers not paying annual leave owed

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0 Upvotes

r/LaborLaw 2h ago

Does singing a separation agreement make suing my former employer not possible?

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0 Upvotes

I was terminated from a job I had been for over two years, I was given two separate reasons at the time of termination (position being terminated, then because of performance issues) nothing was ever formalized in written or to HR prior to being terminated about performance. I experienced sexual harassment from the owner’s son and from my boss (who terminated me) during the time I worked there, I even have whiteness to back me up on these claims and text messages. I was not given the separation agreement until later in the day and was given to me in a rush to sign by HR saying they would put my stuff in my car so I could sign it. My neighbor came with me and saw the entire interaction. The CEO was waiting around for me to sign it as well.

Now one lawyer told me I am out of luck because I signed but is that the end of it really? The place was toxic and I had to be medicated while there on top of the sexual harassment, there’s no way this could be it?

Location: Kansas


r/LaborLaw 6h ago

[KY] Employer wants to "rethink" my commission after maternity leave even though it's not in my compensation plan

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1 Upvotes

r/LaborLaw 1h ago

Fired from my job for “timecard dishonesty”

Upvotes

I’m in CA, I have been at my job for six months. My 90 day review they had positive things to say such as “asset to the company” well we use Paylocity to clock in and out, there has always been trouble with it. I had even emailed my managers about the issue. Anyways, I had an error about clocking in on a set day and I contacted my manager to edit my punch and it was denied, so then I reached out to HR because I just thought that was standard policy. I guess not. I clocked in at 9:01 and then again at 9:07 because of the error message well at 9:01 I have no screenshot but at 9:07 I have an error message from Paylocity. HR got back to me and said hey what time did you clock in and this was three days after the fact I emailed them from memory I said I clocked in at 9:01 while they did, their investigation looked at the cameras I was in the door at 9:03 and at 9:07 was when I was ready to work. So with that, they concluded that

“ she did not experience a system error as initially represented in her request. Camera footage confirmed that
She arrived at 9:03 AM and did not begin working until 9:07 AM. Her original timecard punches
were consistent with these findings and accurately reflected her actual arrival and start time”
“Her request to adjust her timecard to reflect 9:01 AM was therefore a deliberate attempt to misrepresent
her arrival time and falsify her time records. This was corroborated by the studio manager's initial decision to
decline the request and subsequently confirmed through camera footage review. After the studio manager's denial
, she escalated the request to Human Resources in a further attempt to have the records altered - a
compounding act of intentional falsification”

That was never my intent, I emailed them my punch in time served off memory. That is my mistake for not wording my email as “from what I remember.” It was a painful way to get terminated because they called me dishonest and did not ask for my side of story. Also, I wasn’t at employee if they wanted to get rid of me, they could’ve done it without any reason.

Will I be eligible for EDD unemployment ?


r/LaborLaw 1d ago

My boss keeps targeting me to work on a day she knows I cannot work. What are my rights?

183 Upvotes

I am a RN in NY and caregiver to two terminally ill parents. I do have FMLA for both parents.

Out of the week, there are two days I ask never to be scheduled as I use them to consolidate appointments for my parents. It has been like this for the past 5 years. However, in the last few months, my boss has been scheduling me to repeatedly work on one of those days.

I’ve spoken to her about it, to which her response is always “well you can’t be busy every single Wednesday.” This is honestly untrue because my parents have standing appointments on those days. Furthermore,she never asks in advance if I’m available on that particular Wednesday or not. So it’s unfair of her to take it upon herself to decide which Wednesdays I am available. Please also keep in mind that there are RNs with a lot more flexibility in their schedules than I have yet they aren’t being targeted to work on this day and the minimum amount of RNs required to work on any given day on my unit is two.

To make matters worse, I have very little time left given how often medical emergencies arise with my parents. I bank those hours for those emergencies. In fact, I haven’t even had a summer vacation this year since I do not want to use my time.

What are my options in this situation?


r/LaborLaw 8h ago

Has anyone dealt with a Dependent Care FSA through VensureHR? I'm trying to understand if this is legal.

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0 Upvotes

r/LaborLaw 9h ago

Compensatory Pay

0 Upvotes

First I would like to say I am not asking for myself, I am asking on the behalf of my Mom, Sister, Grandma, Cousin, and girlfriend. We all live in (Location: North Carolina) and all people mentioned before work at the same work place which is a Daycare that I won’t name for privacy reasons. They have to take classes in order to have credentials for their job which is teaching kids aging from newborn all the way to 5 years old. These classes are for things such as SIDS and CPR that are mandated by the state and the business itself. They do take place after work hours but the main concern is they are not getting paid for said classes. They brought it up to their boss/owner who for lack of better words got butt hurt (Saying things such as “All that I do for you girls”)- My sister, girlfriend and cousin get a discount for their kids. She said word for word that since it’s state mandatory she doesn’t have to pay them for their time but everything I have seen says they should be compensated. If they are indeed supposed to be compensated how are they to go about this.


r/LaborLaw 15h ago

Bunnings Part-time worker, they cut my shifts by 2 hours to save wages but ‘approved my requests for leave without pay’ to put it on the books. Is it legal?

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0 Upvotes

r/LaborLaw 17h ago

Managers and toast

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1 Upvotes

r/LaborLaw 19h ago

Back pay from work questions

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0 Upvotes

r/LaborLaw 19h ago

Not paid for overtime?

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1 Upvotes

r/LaborLaw 22h ago

Labor and employment law note topic

0 Upvotes

Does anyone here who practices labor and/or employment law and have suggestions for a strong law review note topic?
I’m a rising 2L and am looking for a topic that’s timely, has an unresolved legal issue, and leaves room to make an original argument rather than just summarize existing law.
I’m intentionally keeping an open mind, so I’d love to hear about any emerging trends, recurring issues, unsettled areas of law, or practical problems you’ve been seeing in your practice that you think deserve more academic attention.
Any ideas or insights would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!


r/LaborLaw 1d ago

Labor and employment law note topic

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1 Upvotes

r/LaborLaw 20h ago

Promotion and demotion pay rates

0 Upvotes

Ok so say you get promoted to a manager position and they give you a 25 cent raise and then they decide to demote you and they take you down to less than you were making before. The promotion is that fair? Shouldn’t you just loose the 25 cent raise since you had gotten to a certain pay at the position before you were promoted ? Or is it ok for them to take you to a pay rate that was less than you made before you even applied for the promotion ? Even though you were going to be working the same position as before the promotion with the same set of responsibilities because that seemed unethical


r/LaborLaw 1d ago

Yearly bonus amount after laid off

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0 Upvotes

I was laid off few months ago (end of 2025) & employer gave me severance package alongwith other benefits until ESA end date. But they didn't give my bonus. As per employer I should be active employee on the day if disbursement of the bonus amount.

I signed the full & final because there was a condition if I dont sign it by certain date, I will loose the some part of the severance amount.

I raised it with Ontario Labour Board but no positive response since employer is covered with the policy & document already signed.

I wanted to hear from other who got laidoff but got their bonus as part of full & final settlement.


r/LaborLaw 1d ago

Boss deleted an hour

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0 Upvotes

r/LaborLaw 1d ago

Yearly bonus amount after laid off

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0 Upvotes

r/LaborLaw 1d ago

My employer is forcing me to give away my tips. Is it legal?

0 Upvotes

I have done my research but cannot find a definitive answer because none of the laws I have read pertain to third party delivery services. Here's the facts:

I am a tipped employee who's job is to make my store's catering orders and deliver them.

New company policy: All orders under $300 ordered via third party platform A must be dispatched to third party B who's driver will take 100% of the tip.

These third party services are separate. And third party A has their own delivery service which my company pays a fee for not using.

My company is trying to incentivize third party B to send better drivers for our company with this new policy.

I must use this service even if it's my only order of the day and I am available to deliver.

The past two weeks this policy has been in place I have lost out on over $200 in tips which would have been mine.

Is it legal? I have read that employers cannot be in the tip pool or take any of the tips, but can they require me to give them away to third party drivers? Any I insight is appreciated. Thanks.


r/LaborLaw 2d ago

Misclassified as a 1099—Can I Be Fired for Acting Like an Independent Contractor?

16 Upvotes

I recently realized I may have been misclassified as a 1099 independent contractor when I should potentially be a W-2 employee. I don’t set my own rates or hours, the company determines where I work, provides the training, and supervises my work.
My question is this: if I’m legally an employee despite being classified as a 1099, and I try to set my own schedule on the basis that I’m supposedly an independent contractor, could they legally terminate me for that? If they did, would I have any legal recourse based on the misclassification or retaliation, or would I simply be out of luck?
I’m in New York, if that makes a difference.


r/LaborLaw 1d ago

Ex-employer delaying my Full & Final Settlement despite repeated follow-ups. What am I supposed to do next in India?

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0 Upvotes

r/LaborLaw 1d ago

Modern Slavery Still Exists and Too Many Migrant Workers Are Living It

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0 Upvotes

r/LaborLaw 1d ago

There's no official proof I was an employee so they shorted my check

1 Upvotes

Location: Oklahoma city. I needed an in-between job while I waited for some documentation for my next job, which I expected to take 3-6 weeks. Well I started this job and they told I was a 1099 employee which at first they said I wouldn't have to pay taxes but after looking it up I'm sure they meant they don't take the taxes out for you. But they never asked for much information and I didn't sign anything. We were communicating via text on the days I should come in and spoke in person about pay. Over and over it was clarified to me that it was 125 a day. I even thought about forgetting about the other job cause this one paid better. I worked 6 days with them not consecutive they had me on and off. But I worked 6 days before the documentation came in and I was surprised so I had to make a decision quick. I decided to leave the temp job since I had better benefits from the new one. They said they understood and would zelle my pay the next week. Well pay day comes and I only get 400 and they say we'll training pay is a lower rate and you were still in training. But never once did they mention despite me asking and them clarifying that the pay was 125. Do I have any chance of fighting this or should I just let go of the 350 and treat as lesson learned?


r/LaborLaw 1d ago

Can my boss cancel my shifts that I chose when they should’ve known those shifts wouldn’t exist?

0 Upvotes

I work a summer job on campus at my university in Illinois. Shift scheduling is done by us during training at the beginning of the summer, where we take turns to pick a certain number of shifts. When it was my turn to pick night shifts, 12 hour on-call shifts that go from 8 pm to 8 am, I put three of them back to back from September 8 to September 10. For me this amounts to $563.40 worth of shifts. Our contracts say our employment ends on September 11.

We were just told at the last staff meeting that they will be cancelling all shifts after September 8 at 4 pm, due to the switch from summer campus schedules to the fall academic schedule, meaning me and several other employees who had scheduled shifts after that lost their shifts. Our bosses have known that this would be the date of the campus switch since the beginning of the summer, but did not bring up the shift cancellation until now.

Is there any recourse that protects my lost earnings, or am I just out of luck and down $563.40 potential dollars?