Texas Employment Contracts Legal Questions

The answer to your question can be complicated.  What follows is a very general description of overtime law.  You should contact an attorney or the US Department of Labor - Wage & Hour Division to determine the circumstances of your case and your rights, if any, to overtime. Most employers are required to pay overtime (1.5 x regular hourly rate) to employees who work more than 40 hours in a single workweek.  However, some employees are exempt from this requirement by virtue of their job duties or skill sets.  Executives, Office Managers, location or shift managers, professionals, certain salespeople and computer programers are examples of the types of jobs that can be exempt from the overtime requirement.  These people are typically paid a flat salary for all time be it 30 or 40 or 60 hours in a week.  They are not entitled to overtime and the employer is not entitled to reduce the salary if they work less than 40 hours. Some employers try to cheat the system by calling employees "exempt" and paying them a salary when they do not qualify for the exemption.  Other employers try to treat employees as independent contractors to avoid the requirement.  Both tactics are illegal. You can find more information on overtime exemptions at www.dol.gov.  If you feel you are not being paid correctly, you can contact a private attorney with experience in labor and employment matters (check out www.tbls.org for board certified attorneys) or you can file a complaint with the US Department of Labor - Wage and Hour Division. Good luck.... Read More

Short Answer: Not without your written permission. An employer must pay a houly employee at least twice each month and a salaried employee at least once each month on pre-established dates. An employer may not withhold any amounts from a paycheck (except taxes and court-ordered child support) without the express written consent of the employee. Even with permission, an employer may not withold an amount of money which would cause the employee's wages to fall below minimum wage. Complaints about unpaid wages in Texas can be directed to the Texas Workforce Commission - Labor Law Department (not the unemployment folks).  Ask to file a '"Payday Act Complaint" Good luck.  ... Read More

Your question is chocked full of issues and a number of unclear variables.  My answer here is very general and could be incorrect if certain assmptions are not correct. IF the summary judgment was final as to your case, that is, it decided all claims asserted by all parties, including any counterclaims the defendant may have asserted against you, then you had 30 days from the date that judgment was signed to appeal that decision to the court of appeals for your area of the State, unless your attorney, before that 30 day period elapsed, filed a motion for new trial in the trial court, which would extend that appeal deadline to approximately 75 days.  IF the appeal was timely filed and your attorney failed to pursue it, it is highly unlikely that the original trial court has any power to do anything further in the case. IF the appeal was not timely filed, the same outcome is probably true. IF the trial court's judgment did not dispose of all claims by all parties or if the court granted a motion for new trial, then its jurisdiction to continue to act on the case and its power to change its mind as to the original partial summary judgment likely continues. Your best bet for figuring out where you are in the case is to hire another attorney (try www.martindale.com  or www.tbls.org looking for either an appellate attorney or one who specializes in the subject matter of your case) to examine the court's file.  In the bigger counties, the file may be available online.  I know that sounds like a giant undertaking, but many attorneys will accept a limited engagement where, as here, their only job would be to review the file and advise you as to the status of the case. You should expect to pay for 1 to 3 hours of their time, depending how difficult it is to get the file and how voluminous it is. If you authorized and agreed to pay your original attorney to pursue some kind of post-judgment proceedings and he failed to do it and his time for doing so has expired, you may need to seek the advice of a malpractice attorney to determine whether you have a claim against your original attorney. If the trial court still has jurisdiction over the case and the attorney is unreasonably delaying in pursuing it, you should probably seek a new lawyer. Good luck.  ... Read More

It may well be "geographic discrimination", but there is nothing unlawful about it that I can see.  Assuming that your prospective employer is large enough to fall within the ambit of the relevant statutes, you can't be discriminated against because of your religion, gender, nationality, age, etc., but there is nothing prohibiting an employer from discriminating based on residence.... Read More

The Fair Credit Reporting Act requires that an employer or prospective employer obtain the employee's or prospective employee's consent before obtaining a consumer credit report, which include's most type's of background check data supplied by commercial vendors.  After it obtains the report, the employer is required to provide a copy of it to the employee or prospecitve employee before it takes any adverse action against the employee and provide the employee with an opportunity to respond to any negative information contained in the report.  Damages are available for violations of this law, though lawsuits for such actions are better brought as a class action on all affected employees' belhalf.... Read More

I don't see any case.  First of all, you resigned, so even if the firing was unlawful, what damages did you suffer?  Second, you say that you were not employed at will, but you also said that you signed nothing.  Absent a contract limiting your employer's right to terminate you (which can be an individual contract, a union contract, or can even arise from an employee handbook), you are employed at will.  Your employer can fire you for any reason which is not prohibited by statute (e.g. race, gender, nationality, religion, etc.)   I hope your husband recovers quickly and fully.... Read More

How long an employee has to take action against an employer for "wrongful termination" depends on the nature of the "wrongfulness". If the employee had a contract with his employer and the employer broke the contract, the employee has4 years from the date the company broke the contract to bring a lawsuit.  But beware, this time limit can be shortened by agreement. If an employee refuses to commit a crime and is fired for such refusal,  he has two years from the date of termination to bring a lawsuit. If an employee was fired for race, color, sex, age, disability, religion, national origin he has either 180 or 300 days from the day he was told he was going to be terminated to file a charge of discrimination with the Texas Workforce Commission or EEOC.  The 180 day deadline applies to state claims.  The 300 day deadline applies to federal claims.  However a single timely filing with either agency is sufficient to meet both deadlines. If a public employee was fired for Whistle-Blowing (there is no similar cause of action for non-government employees) he has 90 days to file suit (which may be extended by 30 or so days to allow internal grievance procedures to finalize) So, short answer, "it depends."... Read More

Do you have any basis for believing that corporate was required to adhere to your wife's request?  If there is an employee handbook or contract or some preexisting policy which represented that corporate would keep employee communications confidential, or if corporate had agreed beforehand that anything your wife communicated would be kept confidential, you might have a case, but absent that I don't think you do.  If I say I will give you a car, but only if you agree to only use premium gas, and I agree, you may be able to enforce that.  But if I give you the car, and only then tell you that you can only use premium gas, it's too late; the car is yours and you can do what you want with it within the bounds of the law.  Once your wife conveyed the information without first getting a promise that corporate would keep it confidential, corporate could do what it wanted with the information within the bounds of the law.... Read More

In general, an employer cannot deduct any amounts from your paycheck (other than taxes and court ordered child support) without your written consent.  If you feel that your employer made improper deductions from your paycheck you can file a Payday Act complaint with the Texas Workforce Commission - Labor Law Department.  Such complaint must be filed within 180 days from the pay date on which the issue arose.... Read More

Do you have a contract which limits your employer's right to fire you, such as a provision that says that you can only be terminated for good cause?  Do you believe you are being terminated for some statutorily prohibited reason, such as race, gender, religion, etc.?  If not, your employer can fire you at any time and for any reason.... Read More

Your former employer can't keep you from filing unemployment, but it can challenge your application.  File anyway.  The unemployment system favors the ex-employee.  If you get denied, appeal to the hearing officer.  The instructions about how to do so will be in your letter if you are denied. ... Read More

Since you have a contract, your question cannot be answered generally.  The employee and employer are free contract regarding this issue.  You should retain an attorney to review it and give you his or her opinion. I am curious, are those folks in your group being paid as salaried employees, exempt from overtime?  If so, do you know under what exemption?  Has this change in duties eliminated their qualification from that exemption?  If so, you and your team may be owed overtime for any hours you work in excess of 40 per week.  You might want to start tracking your time, if the employer is not already.... Read More

The Texas Payday Act prohibits deductions from wages (hourly and salary) without the employee's written consent, except for taxes and court-ordered child support. The Texas Workforce Commission - Labor Law Department will enforce this claim for you if it is less than 6 months old.  Bear in mind, if you file it, you will probably be fired.  This statute contains no anti-retaliation provision. Further, the federal Fair Labor Standards Act would prohibit such a deduction if it resulted in the employee earning less than minimum wage for the work-week.... Read More

Your rights in your 401k are determined by the employment contract you entered into with your employer. If you do not have it, the HR department at your company should have a copy of it for you to review. If they have in fact stipulated that you are entitled to a 401k in that contract and have changed their mind, that is breach of contract, but the negotiations concerning this matter likely needed to be had before you formally rejoined the company. ... Read More

The starting point of all employment relationship law in Texas is what is known as at-will employment.  Under this doctrine both the employee and the employer can terminate the employment relationship with or without notice for any reason or no reason at all. There is nothing in the law about either party having to give the other two weeks or any other notice of the end of the relationship. That said, the parties can agree to a required notice period.  Also note the law may create a promise where none is expressly given if one party relies to its detriment on the representation.  Example:  Employer says to a hypothetical Nanny "We are planning to go to Europe next weekend, will you be available to take care of the kids next week?" and the Nanny says "sure" upon which the Employer buys non-refundable plane tickets.  Nanny quits the next day without notice.  ... Read More

The short answer is "yes".  Unless you have a contract with your employer which limits the employer's right to terminate your employment, you can be fired for any reason or no reason, even an incorrect, stupid or wrong reason, as long as that reason is not illegal (race, sex, age, national origin, disability, color, filing a workers comp claim, refusing to commit a criminal act).... Read More

The short answer to your question is 'Yes".  First, unless you have an agreement to the contrary, the employer is free to adjust your work hours to fit its needs.  Second, overtime does not accrue until after 40 hours of work in a single work week, which is a pre-defined 7-day period.  For most employers the work week starts on Sunday and ends on the following Saturday.  So if an employer works an employee 10 hours per day for 4 days and gives him (or makes him take) the rest of the week off, no overtime is due.... Read More

What you describe sounds illegal, specifically it sounds like disability discrimination. The Americans with Disabilities Act requires an employer to offer reasonable accomodations for employees who have a disability unless it would cause a significant expense or burden on the company. For more information, please see here: http://www.eeoc.gov/laws/types/disability.cfm... Read More

Without being able to see the agreement, it is difficult to say whether signing this form is a good or bad idea for you; however, many employers include waivers of trial by jury in their employee manuals and agreements. It is a fairly standard provision and does not deprive you of the right to a trial. It simply limits your case to being decided by a judge. For more specific advice, I recommend contacting an attorney to review the specific agreement and discuss your options. ... Read More