Illinois Employment Contracts Legal Questions

Assuming that you have no contractual limitation on your right to work elsewhere (like a covenant not to compete or to moonlight), and you don't use either business's property (including intellectual property like trade secrets) in service of the other, or divert customers or business opportunities from one to the other, there is nothing to stop you from working for more than one employer.  There is also nothing to stop either or both employers from firing you if they don't like you moonlighting.  You can submit more than one W-2; many people do.... Read More

Generally, one party's breach of a material term of a contract relieves the other party from performance.  If the 3% raise was a material term of the employment contract (it probably was), then the employer's breach of that requirement should relieve your wife from her contractual obligation to give 60 days notice. ... Read More

The difference between an employee and an independent contract is the degree of supervision the hiring party exercises over them and the degree of discretion and autonomy the employee/contractor exercises.  If you hire my law firm to represent you in a case, we will consult with you, but we will have a great deal of discretion as to how motions and pleadings are drafted, what questions to ask at deposition, etc.  The firm would be an independent contractor.  However, the firm tells me where my office is, what cases I should work on, what assistants work with me, etc.  I am an employee of the firm.  The line is often not that clear, and may not be in your case.  ... Read More

None that I can see.  The fact that someone doing the job you used to do is paid more than you were is not in any way improper.  The major league minimum salary today is probably twice what it was 20 years ago, and much more than it was before the players unionized.  Masahiro Tanaka makes $20 million a year, Nolan Ryan made about $1 million, Catfish Hunter made maybe $350,000, Dizzy Dean made probably $30,000, Walter Johnson (the best of all of them) probably made $3,000.  None of them has any right to more compensation just because their successors now make more than they did.... Read More

This provision does not waive any defense that your employer's potential claims are inaccurate, and I can't see any such waiver being enforced by any Court anyway.  In a lawsuit over the alleged breach of a restrictive covenant in employment, the employer will often seek a preliminary injunction to keep the employee from violating the covenant during the pendency of the lawsuit.  To do so, the employer will have to show that it has no adequate remedy at law for the alleged breach, i.e. that money damages will not, for whatever reason, be sufficient.  The clause says that, if you violate the covenant, your current employer will have no adequate remedy at law.  Even if enforced, this will in no way prevent you from raising defenses against the clause, such as that the employer materially breached the contract first.  If the preliminary injunction is granted, the Court will normally require the employer to post a bond to cover damages the injunction may cause the employee if it turns out that the employer was in the wrong.  You are being asked to agree that your former employer doesn't  have to post a bond. I think it unlikely that any Court will consider the first purported waiver to be binding, but more likely that it will enforce the second. I don't see any legal duress which would invalidate the contract.   However, restrictive convenants in employment are often held to be unenforceable, depending on many factors, including whether the employee has specialized skills or knowledge, whether the employer has invested a great deal of time and money training the employee, how long the covenant is to run and how broad it is in geographical scope and whether it needs to run as long or be as broad to protect the employer's legitimate business interests, whether the employee was privy to any trade secrets or proprietary information of the employer, whether the employee received any additional compensation (beyond continued employment) for signing the non-compete, whether the clause prohibits all competition or just some forms of it (such as a restriction on soliciting the employer's customers with whom the employee dealt during his last year before his employment was terminated), whether the employee quit or was fired and, if so, whether he was fired for cause, the competitive environment of the industry involved, etc. etc. In some cases, a Court may "blue  pencil" a clause so that it is enforceable.  For example, if a Court feels that a restrictive covenant prohibiting a former employee from working for any competitor within 50 miles for two years is too broad, it may prohibit the former employee from working for any competitor within 10 miles for a year after his employment terminated.  Whether a Court will edit a clause to make it enforceable or simply hold the entire provision unenforceable often depends on how overreaching the Court thinks the clause was in the first place. ... Read More

An employer needs no reason to eliminate a job and may presumptively do so at any time for any reason or no reason at all. This is so because employment in the United States is "at will," which means that either party is free to terminate the relationship without notice and without a good reason. The same employer is free to hire another worker on a "temp" basis and to make that person "permanent" if it wishes. In other words, despite your having been employed for a long time, you have no legal right to continuing employment.... Read More

As long as the parties agree in advance to a system of very of compensation depending on the quality of the work done by the employee, there is nothing fundamentally wrong with a system of deductions based on poor quality. An employer cannot impose such a system as a surprise after-the-fact, and the effect of the system cannot be to reduce the pay of an hourly employee below the minimum wage.... Read More

No employer is required to act as a reference for a former employee. If you left in unpleasant circumstances, even though you did not engage in any misconduct, your employer may not wish to act as a reference for you; as noted in the previous sentence, that would be perfectly legal. The matter of whetter they will give you a favorable reference should be discussed with the former employer. All of that having been said, no "privacy" or other law prevents a former employer from providing truthful information to a future reference-checker regarding the circumstances of your departure and any difficulties the former employer had with you.... Read More

Your question is unclear. Are these unpaid wages from a period prior to your leave? Or did your employer simply unilaterally cut your pay after you returned? In either case, you may be entitled to be paid the previously agreed rate. You should discuss this with your employer and, if you are not satisfied with the outcome, complain to your state labor department.... Read More

Generally speaking, the burden of requesting FMLA leave is on the employee. Moreover, it may be factually correct that your employment prospects are greater elsewhere. As a general matter, an employer does not need to offer you employment in a place convenient to you if it does not require your services there or can more effectively use your sevices elsewhere.... Read More

When you say that you were not paid, are you referring to money that you had already earned prior to being fired or severance pay?  If you are owed the money for work you had already performed before termination, your employer must pay you, and (assuming you had not previously committed to do this, in an employment agreement for example) cannot require you to do anything else as a condition of being paid.  In most states, there are very serious consequences for an employer who does not pay his employees.  However, if you are referring to money about which there is a genuine dispute such that the employer does not necessarily owe  it to you, or if it is money that the employer is offering as severance pay or in order to obtain a release of claims you may have, it can require you to sign a confidentiality agreement as a condition to receiving money.  In other words, if you are getting something to which you are not already entitled, the employer can require you to give up something (i.e. sign a confidentiality agreement) in order to receive it.  You should be aware that, even if you haven't signed a confidentiality agreement, you may be precluded from disclosing certain confidential information and trade secrets of your former employer.... Read More