The statute of limitations in employment cases limits the amount of time an employee has to bring a claim against their employer, and in recent years, it has been shortened through various methods. More frequently, we’re seeing employment contracts that include a shorter statute of limitations than the time allowed by other laws in the state and forced arbitration agreements that prevent employees from taking legal Read More

The United States Arbitration Act (commonly referred to as the Federal Arbitration Act, or FAA) was enacted in 1925 and provided the ability for courts to oversee private disputes. This includes binding arbitration, where the parties are legally forced to settle through arbitration.  When Does the FAA Apply? The text of the Federal Arbitration Act specifies that an arbitration agreement is applicable if the agreement Read More

You’ve always loved your job. That has never changed, even after a new owner came in after Thanksgiving and made some changes you didn’t like. Some people quit, but not you. You pressed on and even worked 65-hour workweeks during the last two weeks of December to make up for the personnel shortage. Now you’re looking at your paycheck, which states that you worked 40 hours per week, not 65. When you ask about it, Read More

The cat’s paw legal theory has helped numerous employees prevail in court after being unjustly terminated. To understand how and why courts have found in favor of employees due to the cat’s paw theory, you need to know the moral of the story behind “The Monkey and the Cat,” an adapted Aesop fable.  The Story of the Monkey and the Cat A monkey and cat are sitting around a fire in the process of roasting chestnuts. The Read More

Federal and state anti-discrimination laws allow employees who have been discriminated against at work to have their day in court. The underlying principle is that employees who have been treated poorly because of their membership in a protected class (race, age, ethnicity, or religion, to give a few examples) should be able to use legal action to get justice. Unfortunately, employees are not always guaranteed their Read More

More companies these days are turning over the logistics of hiring and onboarding new talent to staffing agencies. Employers enjoy many benefits from using staffing and temp agencies, while workers often experience a state of limbo before getting hired full-time.  During this “probationary” period, workers have the opportunity to settle in while employers can evaluate the worker’s performance and choose not to hire Read More

Over the decades, employees have gained important workplace protections. Starting with the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Title VII of that same law, protected classes have been created to ensure the vast majority of employees may not be discriminated against on the basis of said protected classes. Some examples of protected classes are race, religion, national origin, marital status, sexual orientation, and Read More

Bringing forward a complaint for employment discrimination when your current, past, or prospective employer is a federal agency can trigger long and process-oriented proceedings with the EEOC (“Equal Employment Opportunity Commission”). Our blog for the previous month covered the beginning of this process up to the end of the agency’s investigation. While that might sound like the end of the entire process, there are Read More

Federal employees, like most employees of private entities, are entitled to a number of workplace protections. More specifically, federal employees may not be discriminated against on the basis of their age, race, religion, color, sex, national origin, gender identity, sexual orientation, and pregnancy status. Again, the majority of private employers in Michigan, Illinois, and across the country are also prohibited Read More

It has been a strange and difficult year-and-a-half. In that span, we have gone from knowing very little about the coronavirus to discussing the various types of COVID-19 vaccines approved for emergency use by the FDA. While many companies implemented permanent work-from-home policies, many others are urging employees to return to in-person work. The more we have learned about the virus, the more complex work life Read More