In an effort to avoid their obligations under the Massachusetts Wage Act (“Wage Act”), many employers now condition the payment of commission on continued employment. Sometimes those same employers the fire employees to avoid the commissions because the employee was not working when the commission came due. This may no ... Read More
Tag: wage act
05
Dec2019
Many families in Massachusetts use au pairs to care for their children. The United States Department of State ("DOS") administers this “Au Pair Program,” whereby foreign nationals obtain a special type of visa and are placed with host families in the United States, so that the foreign nationals may provide ... Read More
December 5, 2019Philip Gordon
15
Feb2019
Employers work hard to make sure employees can’t hire their own lawyers. One way to do that is to make sure employee-side lawyers cannot get paid, and that typically means fighting the court award of attorney’s fees.
An interesting question arose recently. Is an employee who settles a case under the ... Read More
February 15, 2019Philip Gordon
02
Jun2014
Employees in Colorado will have increased rights under the state’s Wage Protection Act of 2014. The law has been expanded to give the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment (CDLE) more power to pursue wage claims on behalf of the employee. The new law also includes the expansion of the ... Read More
June 2, 2014Philip Gordon
13
Jun2013
Serious failure to reimburse employees for the business expenses they incur in their jobs may be tantamount to unlawful deductions from wages. In Fraelick v. PerkettPR, Inc., Fraelick sought such reimbursement from her employer, after a couple years’ worth of failures. While business expenses had never counted as ... Read More
June 13, 2013Philip Gordon
11
Mar2013
A Massachusetts man who was paid after being laid off, will receive even more money because his former employer failed to specify that the extra money was for unpaid vacation days. In Dixon v. City of Malden, Mr. Dixon was dismissed from his role as a director of a ... Read More
March 11, 2013Philip Gordon
03
Mar2013
A simple discretionary clause in a commission plan does not disqualify earned commissions from protection of the Wage Act. Prudential Insurance offered commissions to its sales employees under a commission plan. Prudential retained the discretion to interpret and administer the plan, and to deny earned commissions to those ... Read More
March 3, 2013Philip Gordon
12
Jun2009
In what seems like an obvious decision, the Supreme Judicial Court struck down EDS’s policy to deny employees a payout of earned vacation upon termination.
The decision, Electronic Data Systems Corporation v. Attorney General, confirmed that when an employee earns vacation and is fired, the employer must pay out that employee ... Read More
June 12, 2009Philip Gordon
04
Apr2009
Employers can not coerce employees to work for free, deferring wages until the occurrence of some event. Oftentimes employers short of cash turn to their number one expense item, employee wages.
In an effort to reduce their expenses some employers take their needs to an extreme, asking ... Read More
April 4, 2009Philip Gordon
02
Mar2009
Lobbyists for big business have had legislation filed to turn back the clock on Massachusetts employees. The bill, “An Act regarding treble damages” (H3583), marks an effort to shift the burdens onto employees in cases where employers have failed to pay proper wages. If passed, this bill would ... Read More
March 2, 2009Philip Gordon
26
Sep2008
Favorable Wal-Mart ruling overturned. Order decertifying the Wal-Mart class action is reversed, and summary judgment on a number of issues is overturned.
In a suit alleging that Wal-Mart “wrongfully withheld compensation for time worked and denied or cut short rest and meal break to which they were entitled,” the ... Read More
September 26, 2008Philip Gordon
14
Aug2008
Finally, the Wage Act gets its clarification. The law, which goes into effect on July 13, 2008, makes clear that Massachusetts takes violations of the wage statute seriously – with triple damages awarded to employees who must institute lawsuits in order to recover their wages.
The clarification recognizes that ... Read More
August 14, 2008Philip Gordon
17
Feb2008
February 17, 2008
The Hon. Deval Patrick, Governor
Office of the Governor
State House
Boston, MA 02133
RE: Effort to Clarify the Massachusetts Wage Act
Dear Governor Patrick:
I wrote to you in December 2006, as you were assembling your transition team, about a piece of bi-partisan legislation that passed both the House and Senate ... Read More
February 17, 2008Philip Gordon
07
Aug2007
The Massachusetts Appeals Court has affirmed that all employees who receive commissions as a part of their compensation packages, are entitled to the protections of the Massachusetts Wage Act. The case is Okerman v. VA Software.
According to the plain language of the statute, the Massachusetts Wage Act applies “to the ... Read More
August 7, 2007Philip Gordon