In its September 13, 2024 decision in Bodge et al. v. Commonwealth et al., SJC-13567 (2024), the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (“SJC”) ruled that an employer’s policy of denying the accrual of certain benefits to...more
9/19/2024
/ Employee Benefits ,
Employees ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Employment Policies ,
Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) ,
MA Supreme Judicial Court ,
Medical Leave ,
New Legislation ,
Paid Leave ,
Regulatory Requirements ,
State Labor Laws ,
Wage and Hour
On July 31, 2024, Massachusetts Governor Maura Healy, in an effort to increase transparency in pay, signed into law wage equity legislation that imposes new disclosure requirements on Massachusetts-based employers. The...more
8/9/2024
/ Disclosure Requirements ,
Employees ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Filing Requirements ,
Job Ads ,
Job Applicants ,
Labor Reform ,
New Legislation ,
New Regulations ,
Pay Equity Laws ,
State Labor Laws ,
Wage and Hour
On December 21, 2022, New York Governor Kathy Hochul signed a statewide pay transparency measure into law. The new law, which goes into effect on September 18, 2023, requires covered employers and employment agencies to list...more
1/3/2023
/ Disclosure Requirements ,
Employees ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Job Ads ,
Job Descriptions ,
Job Promotions ,
New Legislation ,
New York ,
Recordkeeping Requirements ,
Salary/Wage History ,
State and Local Government ,
State Labor Laws ,
Wage and Hour
On April 14, 2022, the SJC held that where employees’ sole claims for overtime wages rest on the employer’s liability under the FLSA, employees are limited to the remedies provided under the FLSA, and may not receive treble...more
4/15/2022
/ Employees ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) ,
Labor Law Violations ,
MA Supreme Judicial Court ,
Over-Time ,
Retroactive Application ,
State Labor Laws ,
Unpaid Wages ,
Wage Act ,
Wage and Hour
On April 4, 2022, the SJC held that employers must pay treble damages on late wage payments, even if the employee has not filed a Wage Act complaint with the Office of the Attorney General or a court before the payment is...more
On January 15, 2022, New York City passed Local Law 32 of 2022, which requires employers in New York City to post the “minimum and maximum salary” for “advertisements” in a “job, promotion or transfer opportunity.” This...more
4/6/2022
/ Disclosure Requirements ,
Employees ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Job Ads ,
Job Applicants ,
New Legislation ,
New Regulations ,
Pay Transparency ,
Salaried Employees ,
State and Local Government ,
Wage and Hour
On December 13, 2021, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) issued a highly-anticipated opinion, recognizing the concept of joint employment under the Massachusetts Wage Act (“Wage Act”) and setting forth the...more
On November 22, 2021, the U.S. Department of Labor issued a Final Rule that will increase the minimum wage for employees who work on federal contracts. The Final Rule implements Executive Order 14026, which President Biden...more
On October 28, 2021, the United States Department of Labor (DOL) announced a new rule affecting employers with tipped employees. The rule limits the circumstances under which employers may take a “tip credit” against an...more
11/1/2021
/ Department of Labor (DOL) ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Food Service Workers ,
Hospitality Industry ,
Labor Regulations ,
New Rules ,
Restaurant Industry ,
Tip Credit ,
Tipped Employees ,
Tips ,
Wage and Hour
On December 22, 2020, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) issued a final rule revising certain regulations under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) related to tipped employees. However, because of the timing of the new rule,...more
12/30/2020
/ Department of Labor (DOL) ,
Employees ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) ,
Final Rules ,
Hospitality Industry ,
Minimum Wage ,
New Rules ,
Tip Credit ,
Tip-Pooling ,
Tipped Employees ,
Wage and Hour
On September 22, 2020, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) unveiled its long-awaited proposed independent contractor rule. The new rule sets forth a new standard for determining whether a worker can be classified as an...more
Spurred by the uptick in remote work due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the U.S. Department of Labor ("DOL") recently issued a new Field Assistance Bulletin clarifying employers’ obligations to pay hourly, non-exempt...more
On May 18, 2020, the Wage and Hour Division of the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) issued a final rule eliminating a list of businesses prohibited from taking advantage of the commission sales exemption to the overtime...more
Since Congress’s quick passage of the Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA) in late March, the Department of Labor has continued to issue guidance interpreting this new law. While the Department published its...more
In Massachusetts, a commission is a wage subject to the Wage Act when the amount of the commission “has been definitely determined and has become due and payable.” Accordingly, an employer’s failure to pay a commission which...more
Last week, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) released the final version of its new “joint employer” rule. The rule limits the scenarios in which businesses will be treated as joint employers under the Fair Labor Standards...more
Last week, the United States Department of Labor (“DOL”) announced a rule clarifying the types of compensation that should be included when determining an employee’s “regular rate” of pay for the purpose of calculating...more
The new Massachusetts Paid Family and Medical Leave Act (PFMLA) came into effect on October 1, 2019, requiring employers to begin collecting payroll deductions and matching contributions to be submitted to the state...more
On September 24, 2019, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) unveiled the final version of its new overtime salary basis rule. The new rule increases the minimum salary threshold for salary-based overtime exemptions from $455...more
As we reported in previous alerts (April 26, 2019 and May 9, 2019), all employers with 100 or more employees must submit employee pay data for 2017 and 2018 to the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) on an...more
Last week, in Velox Express, Inc., the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) answered what had been a long-standing open question under federal labor law, ruling that the misclassification of employees as independent...more
The past few days saw two major updates to the Massachusetts Paid Family and Medical Leave Act (PFMLA) of which employers should be aware: a three-month extension of various deadlines for employer compliance and the issuance...more
On June 11, 2019, Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker, Senate President Karen Spilka, and House Speaker Robert DeLeo announced that they agreed to delay the required contributions to the Massachusetts Paid Family and Medical...more
Massachusetts law requires that non-exempt employees be paid at least 1.5 times their hourly rate for hours worked beyond the first 40 hours per week, and that certain employees be paid at least 1.5 times their hourly rate...more
As mentioned in our most recent alert on the recently revived EEOC pay data rule, the EEOC has been considering whether, in addition to collecting pay data for 2018 under its new pay data collection rule, to collect pay data...more