In the following guest post, Lucas Roberts, a Management Liability Broker for Burns & Wilcox, examines a recent coverage dispute in which a nonprofit organization unsuccessfully sought to have its insurer defend the organization in a civil rights lawsuit. My thanks to Lucas for allowing me to publish his article on this site. Here is Lucas’s article.Continue Reading Guest Post: Nonprofit with Zero Employees Handles Discrimination Claim Alone
I have been writing this blog for a long time now, and the one thing that I know from the experience is that there is always something new. The latest novelty to develop is the emergence of class action litigation related to employers’ alleged violation of statutorily mandated pay range disclosure requirements. Several states, including the state of Washington, have enacted laws requiring the disclosure in job postings of salary or wage ranges. Class action plaintiffs’ attorneys are quickly targeting employers for alleged violations of these laws, with an at least theoretical potential for massive damage awards. As discussed below, this newly and quickly emerging class of litigation could present some interesting insurance questions. An October 17, 2023, memo from the Ogletree Deakins law firm discussing the new statutory requirements and emerging litigation can be found here.Continue Reading Emerging Pay Range Disclosure Class Action Suits and Related Insurance Issues
The typical employment practices liability insurance policy will contain an exclusion precluding coverage for loss arising from claims brought under wage and hour laws. The question that arises from time to time is whether a particular claim was in brought under the laws for which coverage is precluded. A recent federal court case in California examined whether the wage and hour exclusion in an employer’s EPL policy precluded coverage for the claimants’ claims alleging the employer had failed to reimburse reasonable business expenses, in violation of a California statutory provision. In a November 14, 2016 decision, Southern District of California Judge Ted Moskowitz, applying California law, held that the policy’s wage and hour exclusion did not preclude coverage for the claimants’ unreimbursed business expenses claims, even though the exclusion did bar coverage for the claimants’ other claims. A copy of Judge Moskowitz’s exclusion can be found here.
Continue Reading EPL Wage and Hour Exclusion Does Not Bar Coverage for Expense Reimbursement Claim
In a very short time period, Internet-based social media have become a pervasive part of our lives and culture. Inevitably, employee use of social media has become a workplace issue. As a result, employers are concerned about employee social media use and employees are concerned about privacy and rights of individual expression. As social media
During the 2013 fiscal year (ended September 30, 2013), the number of charges filed with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission was down 5.7% compared with the previous fiscal year, but the EEOC’s FY 2013 monetary recoveries of $372.1 million through administrative processes were the highest ever in any single fiscal year. The EEOC’s February
Lawsuits alleging violations of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) were at an all-time high for the year ending on March 31, 2012, according to a recent law firm study. Moreover, the wage and hour suits are up nearly 350 percent from the equivalent period ten years prior.
According to the U.S. Department of
Every now and then, I run across a case that makes me stop and say, “What?” I had that experience recently when I read the September 21, 2011 opinion of Middle District of Tennessee Judge John T. Nixon in an insurance coverage dispute involving Cracker Barrel Old Country Store, Inc. In the opinion
Cases alleging violations of wage and hour laws have been a growing source of litigation activity in recent years. These cases present a variety of allegations, such as unpaid overtime, employee misclassification, and failure to pay minimum wage. A March 21, 2011 NERA Economic Consulting publication entitled “Recent Trends in Wage and Hour Settlements” takes a
Every now and then, I read a court opinion on a coverage issue, and though I can understand how the court reached its decision, I still find the outcome surprising and troubling. A January 19, 2010 per curiam opinion from the Connecticut Supreme Court (here) involving a coverage dispute under an Employment Practices
According to its January 6, 2010 press release (here), the U.S. Equal Employment Commission announced that near record numbers of workplace discrimination charges were filed with the agency in the fiscal year ending September 30, 2009. As reflected in the agency’s statistical presentation, there were 93,277 charges filed in FY 2009, which