You started a new job. On day one, alongside the I-9 and the direct deposit form, you signed an arbitration agreement. Your employer said all workplace disputes would be resolved through arbitration. You signed. That agreement may be significantly weaker…
“The arbitration agreement they signed with the staffing agency covers us” is the assumption that just got tested in California’s First District — and lost. In Toothman v. Redwood Toxicology Laboratory, Inc., filed May 5, 2026 and certified for publication,…
Belief: the PAGA case lives on even if the employee loses individually. PAGA standing is not abstract. It depends on whether the person bringing the case actually experienced a Labor Code violation. If individual claims are fully decided on the…
Belief: one bad arbitration decision means your arbitration program is unusable. In California, mixed arbitration outcomes happen for a simple reason: different decision-makers sometimes read the same language differently. That is not a license to ignore the problem, but it…
Belief: arbitration agreements are plug-and-play. If you roll one out later, it still works. Timing can turn a routine rollout into a credibility problem—especially when employees are already involved in a pending dispute. The failure pattern is communication pressure: mixed…
Belief: the safest approach in employment disputes is to collect everything. In modern workplaces, collecting everything often increases risk because it floods review with noise, increases handling errors, and makes chain-of-custody harder to explain. A smarter posture separates preservation from…
California’s Supreme Court recently clarified an important question for employers using arbitration agreements: does small or illegible print automatically invalidate the agreement? The answer matters because many California employers rely on arbitration agreements to resolve employment disputes efficiently. However, California…
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