Most California employers who pay team bonuses call them discretionary. The label feels right. The bonuses are not guaranteed in the offer letter, they fluctuate by quarter, and leadership decides the amount. In practice, that label does very little legal…
“He’s a regular. Just deal with it.” That is what her shift manager said. The customer had been coming in for two years. He always asked for her section. He commented on her body, her hair, what she was wearing…
You were not fired. The work was just harder to do every day. The schedule got reshuffled in ways that targeted you and only you. The meetings you used to be in stopped including you. The performance review that was…
Your role was cut and they told you it was AI. The announcement mentioned efficiency, transformation, restructuring around new technology. You walked out with severance papers and a story that sounded clean from the outside. Then you started asking yourself…
Belief: a vendor’s assurance that an AI hiring tool is “bias-free” or “compliant” covers both fairness and legality. A vendor assurance is a marketing statement. Two distinct compliance frameworks apply to AI tools used in employment decisions, and an employer…
A message from a coworker landed on your phone after hours and the tone was off. A Slack thread crossed a line you could not unsee. A conference trip had a moment in a hotel hallway that you keep replaying….
Belief: harassment by customers, vendors, or other non-employees is not the employer’s exposure because the employer does not control the harasser. FEHA liability for third-party harassment turns on response, not control. The standard is whether the employer knew or should…
Belief: California’s heat illness rules are satisfied by having a written plan on file. The plan is the starting point, not the finish line. Cal/OSHA’s outdoor heat illness standard (Title 8, §3395) and the newer indoor standard (Title 8, §3396,…
“It is just a tuition perk; we are fine” is what an owner says about an educational-assistance program that is operating outside §127’s structure. Internal Revenue Code §127 lets an employer exclude up to $5,250 per year in qualified educational…
“We told them about it in the handbook” is the line that does the least work in the lawsuit. Productivity monitoring software — keystroke logging, screen capture at intervals, idle-time scoring, application-use tracking — has moved into small-business operations. A…
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