One of the reasons that abusive situations persist as long as they do, both in family relationships and in the workplace, is that the abuser persuades the people he or she is trying to control that the abuser will make their situation even worse if they speak up about it to third parties. Therefore, they often go out of their way to keep other people from finding out. Survivors of domestic violence will often tell you, years later, of how they went out of their way to show other people that everything was fine, and how, for a long time, they succeeded.
The law is designed to make it easy for employees to notify the relevant parties and, when appropriate, to file lawsuits. Employers sometimes resort to intimidation to stop employees from exercising their rights, but this is against the law, too. The Bozeman retaliation lawyers at HKM Employment Attorneys LLP can help you if your employer took an adverse action against you in response to your exercise of your legal rights.
How Is Retaliation Different From Other Types of Stinky Behavior by Employers?
Employers can set many rules that employees must follow; sometimes, the employee handbook is a hefty three-ring binder full of single-spaced pages. A company’s policies might even afford employees rights and privileges that state and federal law does not require. For example, neither federal law nor Montana law requires employers to provide paid parental leave to employees upon the birth or adoption of a child; the law only requires them to provide an unpaid leave of absence, pursuant to the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA). Despite this, individual companies may set their own paid family leave policies. Likewise, employers might provide the company’s products or services to employees and their close relatives free of charge or at a discounted rate.
Meanwhile, federal and state laws outline the rights that all workers in the state enjoy. Some of these rights relate to compensation for the work performed. For example, minimum wage laws outline the minimum amount per hour that employers must pay, along with exceptions to this rule, such as when employees make a substantial portion of their income from customer tips. Employees who work for the employer year-round and get paid on an hourly basis are entitled to overtime pay for each hour beyond the 40th that they work in a week. Besides these compensation-related rights, all employees are entitled to a workplace free of safety hazards, and they have the right to treatment of work-related injuries at the employer’s expense. This is why the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and the Workers’ Compensation Act exist. Employees with disabilities also have the right to reasonable accommodations for their disabilities in the workplace.
Employers must notify employees of these rights by posting notices about them in the workplace. Just because employees have rights, though, it does not mean that employers always abide by them. Employer retaliation occurs when an employer takes an adverse action against an employee for engaging in a protected activity. If your employer exposes you to safety hazards in the workplace, this is against the law, and an employment lawyer can help you file a claim arising from it, but it is not retaliation. Retaliation is if your employer fires you or demotes you because you complained to OSHA about the safety hazard.
When is an Adverse Action Appropriate, and When is it Against the Law?
An adverse action is any negative action that an employer takes against an employee. These are some examples of adverse actions by employers:
- Writing a negative review of the employee’s performance
- Writing up a disciplinary report about the employee’s conduct
- Changing the employee’s work schedule, work location, or job duties when the employer did not request the change
- Reducing the employee’s pay
- Denying the employee a promotion or raise for which he or she has applied
- Firing the employee
Adverse actions are warranted if the employee engages in misconduct or consistently fails to meet the employer’s standards in his or her work. If the adverse action is the employer’s response to the employee engaging in a protected activity, it is retaliation, and it is illegal. The following are examples of protected activities:
- Filing a workers’ compensation claim for a work injury or occupational disease diagnosis
- Requesting a family leave or medical leave, citing FMLA
- Reporting unsafe workplace conditions to OSHA
- Requesting reasonable accommodations for a disability
- Complaining about workplace discrimination to the employer’s human resources department, the Montana Human Rights Bureau, or the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC)
- Notifying law enforcement about crimes you witnessed while you were at work
- Cooperating with a civil or criminal investigation related to your workplace
How to Protect Yourself From the Effects of Employer Retaliation
You have the right to seek compensation for financial losses you suffered because your employer retaliated against you for engaging in a protected activity. The compensation includes the income you lost due to the employer’s retaliation, as well as legal fees. Some plaintiffs in employer retaliation lawsuits even request non-economic damages for emotional distress or loss of reputation. As with most civil lawsuits, most cases involving employer retaliation end with the plaintiff and defendant agreeing to a settlement amount rather than a judge deciding how much, if anything, the defendant must pay the plaintiff as compensation.
To prevail in an employer retaliation lawsuit, you must do more than simply show that you engaged in a protected activity and that the employer took an adverse action against you shortly afterward. You must also show that there was no justifiable reason for the employer to take the adverse action and that it must have been a response to your protected activity. The employer will try to argue the other side and say that your misconduct or substandard job performance was the reason for the adverse action.
Contact HKM Employment Attorneys LLP, About Employer Retaliation
The Bozeman employment lawyers at HKM Employment Attorneys LLP, can counsel you about employer retaliation claims. Contact the employment lawyers at HKM Employment Attorneys LLP in Bozeman, Montana, to set up a consultation.
