Think the labor board has your back if you have a grievance? Think again.

Long story short: My wife was terminated from a job she'd held for nearly 5 years on April 1st. According to the Nevada Revised Statutes (NRS), her employer is to make her final paycheck available to her within three calendar days, which would have been the 4th at the latest. If an employee is not paid within three calendar days, then that employee is entitled to additional compensation at the rate of 8 hours pay per day for the next 30 days until such pay is finally received. That's the goddamn law, and one would expect the law actually be followed, right?

RIGHT?

She's made numerous calls to the company (a large call center employing several hundred here and thousands more globally), and has spoken to her old supervisors, the head of the department she worked in, and others yet could never get a straight answer about when she'd be paid. She also had not been getting her due vacation hours on her paychecks for nearly two months, and was never given a satisfactory answer about that either.

Finally, in exasperation, we looked up the NRS concerning employment law and termination pay and bookmarked the applicable code sections. When she called the company today and started quoting the law word for word to somebody there, she finally was given a direct transfer to payroll. Finally. Of course, they tell her that her check is ready, but that "due to the nature of her termination" -- total bullshit in itself, but a very long story which I won't bore you with -- she would not be receiving her paid vacation time no matter what, due to "company policy".

We made a call to the State Labor Board about all of this just a while ago. The lady on the phone was very polite with both of us, and was sympathetic when my wife lost control and began to cry because of the enormous frustration she is feeling. But, here's the gist of it:

First, the labor board can't intercede whatsoever in the issue of back vacation time. The lady explained that the law only applies to wages and salary, but not benefits other than insurance issues like COBRA. Okay, we're not happy with that but we can accept it, I guess.

Second -- and this is truly outrageous -- the lady on the phone explained that the office's investigators are no longer able to enforce the law with regard to termination pay "in most cases", "because of the state of the economy".

So, not only are people in this state having an almost impossible time finding employment to begin with, but the system has no interest in backing up those who aren't even being given their final paychecks in a timely manner. I should note that until my wife finally went Legal Eagle on these dipshits at her job, they were asking her to wait several additional days, due to "paperwork errors".

Everyone, please, do yourselves a favor and never take a job with Sitel. As far as call center work goes, they're about as bad as it gets.

The first time your wife called her former employer to inquire about her check, she should have been transferred immediately to payroll. Unless her supervisors/managers are in the payroll department, then their guess is no better than mine. They shouldn't even have waited for your wife to press the point; they should have said "that's a payroll issue, so I'll transfer you."

Honestly, though, I'm amazed that there's any kind of three-day-pay law, because Pennsylvania sure as hell doesn't have that. I had to wait two weeks for my penultimate paycheck and two more weeks for my final one. Eligible vacation was rolled into it, thankfully, so I was able to recoup that benefit, at least.

One thought about your wife's uncompensated vacation time: do employees of that company accrue vacation time on a prorated basis? That is, if they get 15 vacation days per year, then they earn 1.25 vacation days per month of employment per year. They might be able to take all of it in January, but they'll spend the rest of the year earning it. By this metric, though, your wife might only have been eligible for a certain number of vacation days as of April 1st (perhaps 3.75, based on 15 days annually, for instance). If she'd already spent any of those days prior to her termination, then the company might have factored this into her final pay.

At any rate, it's inexcusable that the law isn't enforced. Does Nevada maintain the same policy re: murders and assaults, not prosecuting them because of the state of the economy? Even if that's Nevada's policy, a specific and direct request should supersede the policy and trigger the action on behalf of the employee, regardless of the economy.


I hope that it works out for you both. Has your wife filed for unemployment compensation as yet?

...and "their" word will trump her word every time.

They claim that they had to fire her because of a call in which she became "extremely rude" to a customer all the way back on the 24th of March. She was given no opportunity to review that call for herself, and her totally worthless "coach" at the time just shoved the forms in front of her and that was that.

Now, what our unemployment division will do is deny her unemployment because her termination was "her fault". Of course, she can appeal that denial of benefits, but there's precious little chance that would change anything.

As for the vacation time, she just stopped accruing it for no reason starting around the beginning of March, and was stuck having to ask her totally worthless "coach" about it time and again, before finally going over his empty head. Even then, nothing was ever done. And no, she won't be getting paid any of it whatsoever, not the scant few hours she did have nor the 7 or 8 additional hours she would have accrued over the past few weeks. They flatly told her so on the phone.

I'm seriously wondering if there's a smart lawyer out there, desperate for some work, who wouldn't mind going after these people for wrongful termination. After 5 years with this company, I just don't see my wife flying off the handle and yelling at someone's precious son or daughter during a troubleshooting session. Supposedly it was a complaint from said son or daughter's father which brought all this on.

Finally, she, like myself, is somebody with an above-average IQ but little in the way of formal education. She could be trained into decent work very quickly and would become a model employee. I don't doubt that for a second. BUT, because she doesn't have one of those cutesy "specialized degrees" from some predatory trade school, nor has she attended college, she'll be stuck going to the next low-pay service job like it or not. Such is the way of the world. :eyes:

Again, I don't know NV law, but the standard for denial is usually "was willful misconduct involved?" That is, did she tell her supervisor to go fuck himself, or did she steal from the company, or something like that. A summary termination following rudeness to a customer will not qualify as willful misconduct, unless it comes at the tail-end of a long history of similar infractions (which I don't gather to be the case, based on what you've told us).

Regardless, she must file. If she's denied, then she's denied, and it won't cost her anything. If she doesn't apply, though, then she's guaranteed not to get anything.


I also wouldn't waste time looking for an attorney to file a wrongful termination suit, because it won't get you anywhere. An employer can basically fire you because they don't like the color of your shoes. Sure, they'll have to pay unemployment in that case, but it's not especially likely that they'll be subject to stronger action than that, unless discrimination or harassment was involved, etc.

One minor point: as you pursue this, absolutely do not refer to the call as being "all the way back on the 24th of March," because that was just two weeks ago and just one week prior to her termination! It essentially qualifies as an immediately current event, so if you describe it as happening "all the way back," it will sound like you're trying to minimize it, which won't help your case.


Once more, good luck to you!

for workers. Besides, "wrongful termination" doesn't exist in Nevada; it's called "retaliatory discharge," as a lawyer told me. Nevada has few protections, so cases have to go federal, which means there are very few instances where lawsuits can be filed (discrimination, FMLA, sexual harassment, etc.). It's not worth it.

But she needs to file for UI. She will probably get it. I did, and I was "fired" by an idiot principal, but the state granted it to me when I sent the union's lawyers' brief to them. It was no problem at all.

this surprises me not at all. And the state of the economy was not that bad back then.

And while I'm thinking about it, I may as well also mention that Sitel is one of those "shove the anti-union propaganda down the employees' throats" type companies, a la Target and Wal-Mart.

They had her watch one of those UNIONS BAD! FREE ENTERPRISE GOOD! ME TARZAN YOU JANE! bullshit presentations some time back, and gave her a comment card or some such shit to fill out afterwards. My wife is admittedly not anywhere near as politically oriented as I am, but she leans very much to the left and has one of the strongest senses of justice and ethics I've ever seen. When she told me that she wrote words on the card to the effect of, "well...should a union try and organize the employees here I would be very interested in what they had to say", it was one of the proudest moments of our nearly 7-year marriage. :D

And, yes, our state pretty much sucks at providing any kind of help for people.

I was fired from a service job for being an atheist. When I went to the local board, the man I spoke to said he was more concerned with why I am an atheist than my being fired.

Before I learned of these places, I would have told you that the practices of these companies was illegal and that they didn't exist except as fly-by-night criminal enterprises.

It's disgraceful, and they get the full cooperation of the states and the especially the federal governments.

Considering the business they're in, no wonder they're treating your wife like crap.
Apparently American workers are just "disposable."

NEW REPORT:
Broken Laws, Unprotected Workers:
Violations of Employment and Labor Laws in America's Cities

Available here: http://www.unprotectedworkers.org/index.php/broken_laws/index
Broken Laws, Unprotected Workers

At the start of the 21st century, America's workplace laws are failing to protect our country's workers. Workers are enduring minimum wage and overtime violations, hazardous working conditions, discrimination, and retaliation for speaking up or trying to organize. Broken Laws, Unprotected Workers is the first study of its kind, exposing systematic and routine violations of employment and labor laws in core sectors of the economy. In partnership with Cornell University, National Employment Law Project, and UCLA, we conducted a landmark survey of workers in low-wage industries in Chicago, Los Angeles, and New York City.



In Nebraska the state still helps you get vacation & sick pay

It isn't quick, but they do do it.

K&R!

Raygun cut IRS auditors so the tax code couldn't be enforced. W filled the NLRB with corporate hacks so the National Labor Relations Act couldn't be enforced. The GOPhers in the Senate stonewalled Obama's picks to the NLRB for the same reason. Scalia tells us that women have no right to an abortion, it's OK to execute children and the mentally retarded, we shouldn't have Miranda rights, and that 'militia' really means 'citizens'.

The strategy is so much easier than weathering the political ramifications of changing the laws to screw the public. All you have to do is keep them from being enforced.

You're so sure that she won't be able to collect unemployment, their word against hers.
She should apply,explain the situation about the tape that she never reviewed,and if she's denied appeal the decision and have the DET get a copy,which should be in her records.
Her not applying and you just accepting this makes no rational sense, unless there's more to this story.

:hi:

We did call them, and they pretty much told us to take a 60-yard walk off a 50-yard pier.

Labor Board and DOL are two different agencies. OMG miscommunication. Sorry.