Have you ever reported an employer to your State Labor Board?

[gimmethesimplelife]

Obviously, this question is for US posters but I have to believe that anyone overseas in a developed country would have a similar government entity to report employer misdeeds to.

I'll go first. Yes (no great surprise here, no? LOL) I have - but only once. I briefly held a night audit position for a hotel late 1999. It was an extremely toxic job and for $8.75/hr I was better off waiting tables so I quit. The managers attempted to illegally withhold my paycheck. I can still remember the look of shock on the GM's face when I said, fine, don't pay me, tomorrow morning at 8 AM I will call the State Labor Board and file a complaint. I will then call leave you a message at the front desk to confirm that a State Investigation is in your future. Yes, I did say that and I'm proud of myself for doing so. At any rate, I received a call later that same day telling me a check would be waiting for me at 3 PM. And it was.

I think what made my check appear in my hands? Not so much the in person threat I made - but my follow up call an hour later, passing along the number of the State Labor Board on to the GM and giving instructions as to how to navigate the Labor Board's voice prompts to A. What's in it for me, financially, and B. What's in it for the hotel consequence-wise. To this day I am surprised that the GM listened to the entire call - probably to tape it in it's entirety - but I believe this second call worked this magic.

But enough about me, anyone else have any experience with their State Labor Board? Rob

[iris lilies]

No. I worked for public employers of some size and they like to keep their nose clean on personnel matters. If individual managers acted wrongly (probably some did because no organization is perfect) they got slapped down.

In the library world there were endless discussions about non-exempt employees taking work home, what counts as “work” if they’re riding or driving in a car to and from a conference, etc. because of fear of labor standards violations.

I’m so glad I don’t have to go to work any more to deal with that tedious stuff.

I didn’t report anything to the Labor Board, but I was so mad about one action of my employer I talked to an attorney and made it clear up the management chain that I didn’t care how much my attorney cost me, I wanted a problem resolved or there would be legal action. It was resolved.

What I learned in that little exercise is all the labor attorneys out there want discrimination cases. It was not a discrimination issue I had so I had a harder time finding an attorney but just ended up using someone we had used for an early iteration of our will.

[bae]

Years ago, my boss refused to allow me to take my parental leave upon the birth of my child.

By that afternoon our CEO had a letter in his hand from my attorneys, who had just won a very very public $zillion settlement against a major firm for essentially the same fact pattern.

By the next day, after a 30 minutes meeting with the CEO where he simply asked me "what do you want to fix this?" I had my leave approved, and upon my return I had a raise, a new position no longer reporting to my boss but rather directly to the CEO, and several years of my stock options vested in advance. In exchange for me not taking the next steps.

Worked out well, and helped me leave Silicon Valley a few years ahead of plan.

It was tricky business, as the firm's General Counsel was my wife. This may have hampered them a bit, as she had to step back from involvement in the festivities for several obvious reasons.

In some ways it was a shame I didn't go to the mats, it would have made an interesting precedent - I was perhaps the first male in Silicon Valley to advance claims of discrimination in this particular area, and it probably would have made the news.