Pennsylvania Employment Contracts Legal Questions

Well if you're afraid now to say anything, I'm not sure any advice you get in this forum is going to be helpful from a practical standpoing.  What if I say you're entitled to extra pay?  What are you going to do about it?  Abuse of "assistant managers" in the retail world is well known.  They try to characterize you as management so the can avoid paying you overtime.  There have been many lawsuits over this issue.  The answer really depends on our job duties and specific facts.  The retail world is a tough place to be -- if its causing you anxiety best to find a new line of work as soon as you can. ... Read More

You can probably refuse to provide the information if your job duties do not involve use of your car.  I don't think there's any particlar law that speaks to this issue.  If you don't provide the information and you're fired, you'd be eligible for unemployment compensation in all likelihood.  You can also redact any information from the documents that you deem to be confidential and try that approach .... Read More

In order to be eligible for overtime (assuming you are a non-exempt employee under federal law), you'd have to work in excess of 40 hours in a weekly pay period however that pay period is defined by your employer.  So If you work more than 40 hours in the pay period from Friday to Thursday, you'd be eligible for overtime most likely. ... Read More

  Maybe your daughter is eligible for coveraage under Family Medical Leave Act.  FMLA requires covered employers to provide up to 12 weeks of unpaid, job-protected leave to eligible employees for qualified medical reasons.  The company has to have 50 or more employees and your daughter needs to have worked there for 1250 hours for the last 12 months.... Read More

It depends on whether your company has a written policy or consistent past practice of paying cash for accrued but unused paid time off.  There is no law that entitles an employee to be paid for unused vacation time.  You'd need to have a valid employment contract, an employee manual or consistent past practice to enforce such a thing. ... Read More

Employees paid on a piece-rate basis are not exempt from the various requirements of the Fair Labor Standards Act ("Act"), including minimum wage and overtime.  Piece¿rate is not a new or novel compensation technique; however, in recent years, the U.S. Department of Labor has dedicated substantial resources to investigating, penalizing, and prosecuting employers who misuse the piece¿rate system.  Even under a piece¿rate compensation scheme, employers must pay employees at least the applicable minimum wage for each hour of work (currently, $7.25 per hour).  This does not mean that employers are required to pay a certain rate per piece; rather, employers must ensure that at the conclusion of each workweek, all nonexempt employees have received at least $7.25 for each hour of work performed during the workweek.  It might be that the amount you earned at the piece rate was not sufficient to pay you at minimum wage for those hours and the employer had to adjust your pay so that you received at least minimum wage for that work week.  I don't think I have quite enough information to assess exactly what happened and whether you were paid correctly.   Now if you're saying that you worked over 40 hours that week between production and in-direct time, you are entitled to overtime.  Under the Act, irrespective of whether the employee is paid hourly or on a piece¿rate basis, the employer must pay the employee one and one¿half times the employee's regular rate of pay for all hours worked in excess of 40 hours in a workweek. Again, I'm not sure of the facts.  Sorry I can't be more specific.    ... Read More

Non-compete agreements are enforceable in Pennsylvania.  There is a large body of caselaw dealing with issues surrounding non-compete agreements.  Whether and to what extent they are enforceable depends on the facts and circumstances relating to the execution of the agreement and the detailed language of the agreement.  I'm not certain what question you are asking.  If "coming after me" means your former employer has initiated litigation, then the enforceability of the agreement will be put to the test in the courts.  If they've sent a "cease and desist" type of letter, then it's time to get an attorney invovled on your end to review the agreement, the facts and advise you on a prudent course of action.  ... Read More

You don't have to sign any agreement that you don't want to, although, if your former employer is giving you something in exchange for your agreement (e.g. severance pay, etc.), it may be in your best interest to do so.  Moreover, agreement or no, you have a legal obligation to maintain the confidentiality of your former employer's trade secrets.... Read More

The circumstances of your husband's termination as you describe them fit squarely within the "at will" law of employment in Pennsylvania.  Employers can terminate employees for no reason at all.  It's hard to take but that is the law.  There are certainly some reasons for termination that would give rise to a wrongful termination claim (based on age, gender, race, etc.).  I do not see an actionable claim here on your behalf.  Your husband can file for unemployment compensation and should do so as soon as possible.  Maybe you can move sooner?  Sorry that I couldn't give you better news. ... Read More

Most employees are at will and yes, they enjoy less job security than those who have employment contracts with definite terms and/or restrictions on termination.  However, assuming that you do not have such an employment agreement now and are therefore employed at will, not signing the agreement will not change your status - you will still be at will - and your employer has the right to fire you (or not hire you in the first place, depending on your status) if you don't sign the agreement.... Read More

Pennsylvania is what is called an "employment at will" state.  What this means is that employers can terminate employees for any reason, or no reason at all.  There are certainly exceptions to this rule. For example, an employer cannot terminate an employee because of the employee's race, gender, disability, etc.  Whether or not you were "at fault" for the accident is probably not relevant to whether you were wrongfully terminated.  However, if the incident is reportable to some type of governmental authority, and you told the employer you were going to report it and the employer terminated you in order to cover the matter up, that might be a wrongful termination.  As with most situations, the specific facts are quite important.  We'd need to have further discussion in order for me to give you a more definitive answer. There may be other issues relating to your employment that could be used to prevail upon the employer to change its mind and restore your employment This all being said, you should certainly file for unemployment compensation benefits.  Whether you were at fault in the accident is less important in determining your eligibility for those rights.  My law firm is the provider law firm in Pennsylvania for LegalShield, a provider of legal services memberships.  For as little as $25 a month, you can get telephone consultations, documents reviewed and letters written on your behalf, representation for traffic tickets, will preparation and more.  Memberships are sold through independent sales associates.  If you are interested in learning more, I suggest that you contact pbergerjr@legalshieldassociate.com.  Once you become a member, you can contact my firm via our 800 number and talk further about this legal matter with me or one of the attorneys on my staff. ... Read More

The fact that you are being asked to take a salary cut may affect the enforceability of your non-compete if you decide to quit instead, but unless you have a contract (it can be a collective bargaining agreement or possibly arise from an employee manual) which provides for a definite salary for a definite term (i.e. employer will be paid $80,000 annually for the next two years), or you are being discriminated against by being forced to take a cut others are not based on reasons prohibited by statute (i.e. you are being treated differently because of your race, religion, gender, etc.), your employer has the right to cut your salary, and your only recourse is to quit if you don't want to accept the cut.... Read More

You should not be liable for Bob's injury which occurred when he was not working for you.  If Bob was moonlighting for McDonald's, there wouldn't even be a question.  The problem is that, because Bob was doing work on the same project on which you were working, it could look as if he was doing work for you, and others (like the g.c.) may argue that he was.   But if you can show that Bob was not in fact working for you, but rather doing separate work for someone else for which the other party paid him, you should not be liable. For the record, this has nothing to do with the legal doctrine of respondeat superior.   Respondeat superior is a legal doctrine which makes an employer liable to third parties who are damaged by wrongdoing or negligence committed by an employee while acting within the scope of his or her employment. ... Read More

I was just about tto write you that your question could not be definitively answered because the enforceability of such clauses depends on a great many factors which a Court would have to weigh ... and then I read that  you were seeking employment in California.  California law prohibits such clauses pursuant to Business and Professions Code 16600 et seq.... Read More

Presumably you agreed to repay your employer becuase you owed it money.  Did your repayment agreement also provide that, if you repaid your debt, your employer would not fire you?  If so, your employer has breached the agreement, and you can sue it for breach of contract.  If not, however, I don't think you have a valid claim, unless you believe that you were terminated for other impermissible reasons, for example your race, gender, religion, etc., or in breach of some other agreement like your employment contract (if, for example, it provided that you could only be fired for specific reasons, or that you would be employed for a specified period of time.... Read More

Unless you had a contract with your employer which either had an express duration (e.g. a two year employment contract) or limited the grounds for which you could be fired (e.g. employee can only be terminated for the following, and a list of grounds), or you believe you were terminated for statutorily prohibited reasons, such as your race, gender, religion, certain whistleblowing activities, etc., you were employed at will and could legally be fired at any time and for any reason. However, to the extent that your former employer, or anyone who works for him/her/it, has communicated to anyone that you were a thief, and you can show that you were damaged by this false statement (e.g. if you were unable to get a job you would have gotten because of the false accusation), you can sue your former employer for defamation.... Read More

I assume, since you are asking about employment law and not the interpretation of a contract, that you have no employment contract which prohibits you from "moonlighting". There is no general prohibition against working for more than one business, although it could get tricky, especially if they are competitors in any way.  You owe your employers a duty of loyalty, which you can't breach.  For example, you can't do work for one employer using the other's time or resources - you can't spend your time at one job doing work for the other, you can't use the postage meter from one job to mail correspondence for the other, etc.  Also, you can't use confidential information from one job on the other.  If one employer has a confidential list of potential customers, you can't use it on the other job.  Also, you can't divert an opportunity, like a customer inquiring about one employer's goods or services, you can't divert that opportunity to another employer or yourself. You should also realize that, again assuming no contract to the contrary, there is no prohibition against your employer firing you for moonlighting if he/she/it finds out.... Read More

The answer depends on whether there is some restriction, either contractual or statutory, on your employer's right to pay employees whatever they agree upon.  Do you have a contract with your employer which provides that you will receive the same pay as others in your position?  Is there a collective bargaining agreement (union contract) which sets wages for workers of your type?  Do you believe that the employer is discriminating against you on some basis which is prohibited by statute (e.g. because of your race, gender, religion, ethnicity, etc.) or that the employer is favoring the other employee for an unlawful reason (e.g. in return for sexual favors).  If the answer to each of the above questions is no, then the employer can pay any employee whatever he has agreed with each employee, subject to minimum wage laws.... Read More

An employer can consider anything it wants in the hiring decision, other than those factors excluded by statute (race, religion, etc.) or contract (for example, if a union contract provides that an employer can only use union labor), and often smaller employers are not even subject to those limitations.  I doubt very much that the information about your offense would be readily available, but it is probably a public record, and therefore the prospective employer could theoretically, if it wanted to go to a lot of trouble, access it.... Read More