Employment Counseling

CONSULTING PRACTICE
In its consulting practice, Rose Kallor’s primary goal is to enable clients to avoid litigation though education, training, awareness and protocols.  Its secondary goal is to reduce the risk of exposure in the event litigation is commenced.  Our attorneys assist employers in drafting and administering policies that adhere to complex and varied legal requirements and that are applicable to the client’s business.  Further, our attorneys are regularly available to our clients on an as needed basis to assist them in making challenging decisions. 

We also provide training opportunities for avoiding and properly addressing discrimination/sexual harassment complaints, addressing issues relating to mandated (and non-mandated) leaves of absence, recent Supreme Court decisions in the field and other issues that affect the employer/employee relationship.  Moreover, given the changes in labor and employment law, the firm routinely alerts its clients to key rulings and decisions.

ANTI-DISCRIMINATION
Our attorneys regularly advise employers on their obligations pursuant to state and federal anti-discrimination laws, including development of policies and practices and neutral enforcement of such policies so as to avoid or limit exposure under these laws.  We also regularly provide guidance on the leave of absence and the interplay between applicable state and federal laws.  Our attorneys offer training on conducting discrimination/harassment investigations and will often conduct such investigations in the event our clients believe referral to a third party is appropriate.

WAGE AND HOUR
Wage and hour compliance has been becoming an increasing concern to employers given the rise of collective actions and the increase in back wages and penalties assessed against employers by the State and Federal Department of Labor.  In fact, according to the United States Department of Labor, it collected more than $220 million in back wages for over 341,000 employees in fiscal year 2007. Back wage collections exceeded the record levels collected in fiscal year 2003 by 3.8 percent. The agency concluded 30,467 compliance actions and assessed over $10.3 million in civil money penalties. 

It is our experience that the majority of employees classified as exempt are not properly classified.  In the event these employees are working more than 40 hours/week, that misclassification can have expensive consequences in the event an employee challenges the classification and contends that she is owed back wages for overtime worked.  Further, since employers often do not keep time records for exempt employees, there is no accurate record of the hours worked, and there is often a dispute as to the number of hours worked in excess of 40.  

Rose Kallor’s philosophy is to be proactive by avoiding claims by assisting businesses in auditing their job descriptions to ensure that positions are correctly classified.  Further, Rose Kallor assists management to develop policies and practices so as to avoid improper deductions to otherwise exempt employees which could defeat their exempt status.  Finally, Rose Kallor provides training to high and mid-level management to ensure that they are educated in this complicated area of the law.  When necessary, Rose Kallor can defend employers in administrative and judicial proceedings claiming violations of the state and/or federal wage and hour law.

Connecticut Law Tribune Article