This past April, in her first oversight meeting before the U.S. House of Representatives, Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) Chair Charlotte Burrows was asked whether the EEOC intends to return to its brief and controversial practice of collecting pay data from employers. She hedged her answer, refusing to give an outright “yes.” She explained the commission would wait to hear from the National Academy of Sciences on the topic before coming to a decision.

The Texas Supreme Court just issued an important opinion on the payment of commissions to employees. The employer’s failure to simply insert one extra paragraph in an offer letter resulted in a whopping verdict against it of $962,336.89 for unpaid commissions, $80,282.63 in prejudgment interest, and postjudgment interest at 5%, to say nothing about attorneys’ fees! To avoid this fate, read on.

We have previously noted the COVID-19 pandemic will create novel legal questions for employers, most of which are yet to be answered. Although workers’ compensation is generally the exclusive remedy for workplace injuries, that system is a creature of public policy and is sometimes modified by public policy. Additionally, unlike many workplaces’ safety risks, this pandemic created health consequences that, by definition, could create injury to others.

A plan from the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to make more employers susceptible to joint employer status is expected to make a major change to the landscape for employers that use staffing companies or operate under the franchise business model.

Acting director of the Wage and Hour Division, Jessica Looman, announced the agency will issue a new final rule defining who is an independent contractor under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). This long-delayed announcement seeks to end the administration’s halting efforts to repeal and replace the last-minute Trump administration independent contractor regulation.

A recent Texas case illustrates the pitfalls an employer can face when former employees make claims for commissions or compensation after their employment has ended. It also offers suggestions on how employers with commissioned salespeople can avoid the same traps.

Good news! During these times of challenging recruitment, a viable applicant seems interested in your business. What’s the next step to set the hook? A job offer letter serves many purposes. It should enhance the candidate’s interest in the opening and protect your company against claims that it misrepresented the employment opportunity. The letter also must be substantial enough to allow the applicant to resign from current employment. In other words, it must sell the job.