Posted on 04/01/2020 7:10:47 PM PDT by LouAvul
Hypothetical. An employee is paid every two weeks. He worked for two weeks before his first paycheck. His checks are always two weeks in arrears.
His employer tells him his (the employee's) hours are getting cut in half and that his salary will be halved accordingly.
However, the following paycheck followed two weeks of full time work. The employee is owed a full paycheck since he hasn't even started working part time yet.
Is this illegal? Can the employer simply take the employee's legally earned wages?
I should have pointed out that the employee got a half salary check when he was owed a full check. He got a half check before he even started working part time.
Why a hypothetical question?
I knew a lady had eight kids, but she passed awhile back.
Tell the employer there was a mistake
If you can wait until tomorrow I’ll ask my wife. She’s sleeping now.
There are differences in labor law by state but if a man worked the hours he should be paid for the hours
Check with the “Going Postal” experts.
If the total hours worked is 80, then the paycheck has to reflect 80 hours of wages.
(The answer to your question lies in the pay statement.)
Employers have to pay workers for the time they worked. They can not retroactively reduce the pay or waive away hours worked. The state department of labor would be the proper place to lodge a complaint and even in the middle of shutdowns, they will take immediate action.
Additionally, they face heavy penalties for doing so, plus additional penalties for intentionally under-reporting wages to evade taxes on wages.
I’d simply assume that a mistake was made, notify the employer, and assume they’ll have makeup checks issued within a day or so... If they’re not complete and utter morons.
Even if it was illegal, and they regularly, or even sometimes got away with it, they would be doing it.
Obviously it is illegal. The employee may have to get some DOL help, but they should win.
Okay, you didn’t bite on my “Labor” lame joke so, I’ll answer your “hypothetical”.
Very often when a week or two is initially withheld it is withheld as a final paycheck that is paid out when the employee is let go. Or, in the highly unlikely scenario that the employee works there long enough to retire (highly unlikely these days) it is paid then.
Under this scenario, the employee will not see that pay period until one of those two events occurs. The pay they will receive is the pay they earn post the withheld week or two.
In NC it matters alot if you are a wage employee by the hour and punch a time clock. But you used the word salary. Salaried employees have different rules.
Is this really just a “hypothetical” as you say,
or are you “cough (asking for a friend) cough”?
When I worked in California back in the 1980s, wages had to be issued the same day you terminated an employee. There was a daily penalty added if you were going to write and mail the check later. We even had an employee bounce a check on the company. Even the amount of the check could not be withheld from the final wage check.
Pennsylvania is the other extreme. You can terminate an employee for looking at you cross-eyed after a single written warning. The last check goes out with the regular pay cycle. But it still has to go out. It is also why we also pay among the highest unemployment checks in the nation.
Simple contract law says you had a contract for a specific amount of pay and the employee performs his part the employer has to compensate according to the contract.
I worked for NY State, and they held back two weeks before we received a paycheck, which meant I had to wait a month before I got my first check. That two weeks they held was supposed to be given us at our retirement, based on the salary we were making when we retired not on the salary we made when we originally earned it.
When Mario Cuomo was Governor, he attempted to force us to work another week without pay, and that third week would be added to the two, and it would be given to us when we retired...that is, if you were lucky enough to live to retire. The Union put up a big stink, and he backed down.
This should be detailed in an Employee Handbook or some such material provided upon hiring each employee.
You are correct. This is explained to an employee prior to the employee agreeing to the terms of employment. With smaller companies there might not be an “Employee Handbook” (small companies cannot afford to waste money compiling such things) but, nonetheless, it is usually a point of discussion prior to an employment contract.
80 hours work equals 80 hours pay. Period.
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