WeComply, Inc.

Taco Bell Operator to Pay $27,000 to Settle Religious-Discrimination Suit

Tue, 08 May 2012 15:47:22 GMT

The operator of a chain of Taco Bells agreed to pay $27,000 to resolve a lawsuit brought by the EEOC, which alleged the company engaged in religious discrimination by firing an employee for refusing to cut his hair. According to the lawsuit, the employee is a Nazirite – a member of a religion that prohibits hair cutting -- who had not cut his hair since he was 15 years old. The company ordered the employee to cut his hair to comply with its grooming policy. The employee explained that he could not cut his hair for religious reasons, but the company gave him an ultimatum – cut his hair or lose his job.

Title VII requires that employers reasonably accommodate employees’ religious beliefs or practices unless doing so would be an undue hardship on the operation of the business. Among the practices the EEOC says employers must accommodate are “dress or grooming practices that an employee has for religious reasons”, such as Jewish yarmulkes, Muslim headscarves, Rastafarian dreadlocks and Sikh uncut hair and beards.

An employee's affiliation with an non-traditional religion does not lessen the employer’s obligation to make reasonable accommodations. According to the EEOC, “The law protects not only people who belong to traditional, organized religions, such as Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, and Judaism, but also others who have sincerely held religious, ethical or moral beliefs.”

WeComply’s preventing discrimination and harassment training courses teach managerial and nonmanagerial employees crucial aspects of anti-discrimination law so they can identify and appropriately respond to issues that arise on the job.

Medicare Strike Force Tries New Tactic

Tue, 08 May 2012 15:40:27 GMT

Federal authorities have adopted a new enforcement strategy to put pressure on Medicare fraudsters. The new practice, known as "Medicare payment suspension," played a key role in a recent government strike force involving an alleged $452 million in Medicare fraud.

The idea behind Medicare payment suspension is simple: Cut off Medicare payments to healthcare providers who are under investigation for fraud. Previously, a provider could continue to bill Medicare and receive Medicare payments while the investigation was underway. The government had to fight an uphill battle to recover payments it had made to providers later found to have committed fraud. According to Department of Justice officials, Medicare's upfront payment system made Medicare fraud particularly attractive to organized-crime operations. Now, the government has authority to withhold payments to suspicious providers if there is sufficient evidence of fraud. Authorities hope that the new policy will eliminate some incentives to commit fraud in the first place.

In the strike-force operation that led to the arrests, accused healthcare providers made cash payments to a series of co-conspirators to work the Medicare system. First, providers used paid recruiters to steer Medicare recipients their way. The providers then paid the "patients" to make claims for high-end services and medical equipment.

Critics of the new payment-suspension policy are concerned that innocent healthcare providers could get caught in the enforcement dragnet. The intricacies of Medicare billing can give rise to honest mistakes that healthcare providers worry could trigger a fraud flag on their accounts. Many providers are signing up for Medicare compliance training for their staff to instruct them in the essentials of Medicare compliance.

Wal-Mart to Pay over $5 Million for FLSA Violations

Tue, 08 May 2012 15:14:01 GMT

The Department of Labor reached an agreement with Wal-Mart – and issued a stern warning to other companies -- after finding that Wal-Mart violated the overtime provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) by misclassifying more than 4,500 employees as exempt from overtime pay.

The case involved Wal-Mart’s vision-center managers and asset-protection coordinators. Wal-Mart did not pay them overtime because it considered them exempt from the FLSA’s requirements for overtime pay, but a DOL investigation found that the employees were nonexempt. Wal-Mart and the DOL have been engaged in negotiations over back pay since 2007. In April 2012, Wal-Mart agreed to pay the employees $4,828,442 in back pay and damages. Wal-Mart will also pay $463,815 in civil penalties because of the repeated nature of the violations.

The Secretary of Labor said the case should send a “signal” to all companies: “Misclassification of employees as exempt from FLSA coverage is a costly problem with adverse consequences for employees and corporations. Let this be a signal to other companies that when violations are found, the Labor Department will take appropriate action to ensure that workers receive the wages they have earned.” Emphasizing the same point, a spokesperson from the DOL’s Wage and Hour Division said, “The damages and penalties assessed in this case should put other employers on notice that they cannot avoid their obligations to their employees by inappropriately classifying their workers as exempt.”

WeComply’s worker classification and Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) online courses offer training in how to distinguish between exempt and non-exempt employees, as well as other crucial real-world labor issues.

EEOC Says Unions are Not Beyond the Reach of Title VII

Tue, 08 May 2012 14:47:12 GMT

The Equal Opportunity Employment Commission sued a Florida union, the Jacksonville Association of Firefighters, alleging that the union engaged in intentional racial discrimination by negotiating, in collective bargaining, in favor of promotional exams that had a disparate impact against African-American candidates.

Title VII defines disparate-impact discrimination in testing as an employers’ use of tests or selection procedures that are neutral on their face but have the effect of disproportionately excluding people based on race or other protected characteristics, if the tests are not job-related and are not consistent with business necessity.

In this case, both the EEOC and the Department of Justice claimed that the promotional tests had a disparate impact on black firefighters seeking promotion. DOJ filed a lawsuit against the city of Jacksonville, and the EEOC filed a lawsuit against the union. The EEOC claimed that the union engaged in intentional racial discrimination because it negotiated in favor of the tests even knowing that the tests had an adverse impact against African-American test takers.

An EEOC spokesperson said, “The union’s insistence on maintaining the current promotional process has deprived many qualified African-Americans of promotional opportunities. We hope this lawsuit sends a clear message: Unions have a responsibility to oppose, not acquiesce in, racially discriminatory employment practices.” The EEOC is suing the union for compensatory and punitive damages and is also seeking a court order to prevent the union from advocating for the tests in a new collective-bargaining agreement.

WeComply’s preventing discrimination and harassment courses teach managers and employees about critical aspects of anti-discrimination laws, using an interactive format that promotes learning and understanding of issues with real-world impacts.

Small Surgery Practice Fined for HIPAA Violations

Tue, 08 May 2012 14:09:37 GMT

Small-practice doctors and solo practitioners beware: The small size of your practice won't save you from being fined for violations of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act Privacy and Security Rules. The Office for Civil Rights of the Department of Health and Human Services recently imposed a $100,000 civil penalty against a five-physician cardiac-surgery practice in Phoenix and Prescott, Arizona for HIPAA violations.

The Arizona surgery practice drew the attention of HHS when someone complained to the agency's Office for Civil Rights about the surgeons' website, which contained a publicly accessible Internet-based calendar that made patients' surgery schedules and appointment dates visible to anyone who visited the site. When agency representatives investigated the complaint, they discovered that the practice had failed to comply with a number of HIPAA requirements since the Act became effective in 2003.

The practice did not have adequate policies and practices in place to protect patients' records, and it failed to document HIPAA training for its employees. It had not designated an information-security official or analyzed its security risks, and it did not have adequate contracts in place with the vendors that administered its e-mail and calendaring service. In addition to paying the $100,000 fine, the owners agreed to take corrective action to remedy noncompliance.

Previously, small to mid-size practices had agreed to implement corrective action plans but avoided civil penalties. Speaking about this case, the director of the HHS Office of Civil Rights said: "OCR expects full compliance no matter the size of a covered entity."

Nursing-Home Assistants Subject to the Highest Rate of U.S. Workplace Violence

Wed, 02 May 2012 14:50:36 GMT

A new directive from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) addresses workplace violence, calling it “a recognized hazard in nursing and residential care facilities.” OSHA officials who inspect these facilities are instructed to “investigate for the potential or existence” of incidents of workplace violence during their regular investigations. This instruction also applies to worksites in other industries that have a high incidence of workplace violence.

No other industry, though, has as high a rate of workplace violence as the nursing-home industry. A 2009 study conducted by the University of South Florida found that “[n]ursing assistants working in long-term care facilities have the highest incidence of workplace violence of any American worker.” The study found that an astonishing 27% of all workplace violence in the U.S. took place in nursing homes.

The study contained other startling statistics: Certified nursing assistants are physically assaulted an average of nine times per month, while 70% of all nursing-home staff are assaulted at least once a month. Most assaults are by residents with dementia.

Assaults against workers in nursing and personal-care facilities were 2.5 times more frequent than assaults against workers in the health services industry overall, according to 2001 data from the U.S. Department of Labor. DOL statistics from 2010 showed that there were approximately 2,130 assaults against workers in nursing and residential care facilities.

Medicare Compliance Training Now Available from WeComply

Tue, 08 May 2012 13:38:29 GMT

May 10, 2012 (Mount Kisco, N.Y.) -- WeComply, Inc., a leader in web-based ethics and compliance training for employees, has announced the release of a new course on "Medicare Compliance." This course enables organizations providing healthcare or administrative services under a Medicare Advantage (Part C) and/or prescription-drug plan (Part D) to fulfill the federal requirement to train all employees annually on compliance awareness, conflicts of interest, and the prevention of fraud, waste and abuse.

The course provides an overview of the Medicare system and the compliance requirements of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). It includes a discussion of conflicts of interest and the giving and receiving of gifts and business courtesies. Finally, it addresses the issues of Medicare fraud, waste and abuse with explanations of the pertinent federal anti-fraud laws, the penalties for fraud, and the methods that employees can use to report instances of fraud, waste or abuse that they encounter.

“It is estimated that some $67 billion to $230 billion of healthcare-related spending is lost to fraud, waste or abuse each year,” said Mike Pallatta, WeComply CEO. “This is obviously a huge problem and, accordingly, CMS requires that organizations providing healthcare or administrative services train their employees on these issues annually. WeComply’s Medicare Compliance course is an excellent way for these organizations to keep their employees properly trained -- and fulfill the CMS requirement.”

For more information on WeComply’s Medicare Compliance course, please visit http://www.wecomply.com/ethics-training/829519-medicare-compliance-training-courses-classes.

About WeComply
WeComply is a leading provider of customizable online ethics and compliance training solutions, offering more than 70 courses on such topics as anti-corruption, antitrust, Code of Conduct, data privacy and security, discrimination and harassment, healthcare compliance, insider trading and whistleblowing. For more information, visit www.wecomply.com.

Smartphone Apps Put Companies at Risk

Thu, 03 May 2012 13:04:19 GMT

Companies that have invested in information security systems that quarantine viruses and detect intruders have discovered a new threat: their employees' personal mobile devices. Increasingly, companies have been letting office workers use their personal smartphones and tablets on the job. It seemed like a win-win solution: Employers gained no-cost access to expensive productivity tools, and employees got to use their preferred mobile devices.

The problem lies in the apps that employees have downloaded onto their devices. Workplace restrictions don't apply to their personal property, so employees are free to put whatever apps and games they want to on the devices. Every time an employee downloads an app to his work-enabled smartphone, he may be putting the company's computer network at risk for infection by malware or viruses that were embedded in the downloaded app.

Information security specialists say that malicious hackers have adopted app stores, where consumers buy online programs for mobile devices, as their primary means for distributing malware. In most cases, the consumer has no idea that malware came with the downloaded app. An embedded program may capture passwords and account numbers, send expensive text messages or transmit confidential company data that the employee has stored on the device.

Smartphone providers have different solutions for the problem. Apple, which guards information about threats to its devices, is known for scrubbing apps of malicious code before offering them for sale in its iTunes app store. By contrast, Google has stepped up the online safety features at Android Market, its app store. Google reports that it scans every app for malware before offering it to consumers. In addition, the Google Android operating system can be set to prevent the downloading of third-party apps.

WeComply's online information security course gives employees the training they need to understand how to protect the information they handle in their jobs.

Failure to Preserve Company Records Leads to Criminal Charges

Thu, 03 May 2012 13:00:19 GMT

With the arrest of former BP engineer Kurt Mix, federal prosecutors sent a strong message about a company's duty to preserve records when it is under a federal criminal investigation. Authorities charged Mix with obstruction of justice for deleting text messages about the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster from his iPhone. He was released on a $100,000 unsecured bond hours after his arrest.

Prosecutors allege that the Texas man deleted hundreds of messages that he had exchanged with his supervisor and a contractor in the 87 days following the explosion, while 53,000 to 62,000 barrels of oil per day were spilling into the Gulf of Mexico. Mix's job involved estimating the amount of oil that was leaking into the Gulf and figuring out a way to control the leak. The volume of oil leaked affects the criminal fines imposed on BP under the U.S. Clean Water Act. While the oil flowed, some lawmakers accused BP of underestimating the amount of oil involved in the leak. Investigators believe that the messages Mix deleted contained important information about the true volume of the oil flow.

According to FBI records, BP issued "legal hold" notices that advised employees to save electronic messages, including text messages, related to the disaster. In spite of having received the notices, Mix deleted messages from his iPhone in October 2010 and again in August 2011. BP has not explained what it did to preserve the messages beyond notifying Mix that his records were part of an investigation.

Investigators used forensic tools to restore some of the deleted files; other messages could not be recovered. The arrest illustrates the importance of compliance training on issues such as record management, litigation holds and internal investigations.

War on Healthcare Fraud HEATs Up

Thu, 03 May 2012 15:57:53 GMT

The federal government is waging a new, high-tech war against healthcare fraud, and the message from Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius to criminals thinking about committing Medicare fraud is “don’t even try.” Improved collaboration between the Obama Administration’s Health Care Fraud Prevention and Enforcement Action Team (HEAT) — a joint effort of The Department of Justice (DOJ) and Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) — and its interagency Medicare Strike Forces has resulted in a nearly 75% increase in the number of individuals charged with fraud from 2008 to 2011. This culminated in the DOJ's record-breaking recovery of nearly $4.1 billion in fiscal year 2011 as a result of anti-fraud efforts.

The Affordable Care Act, enacted in 2010, provides enhanced methods and critical new tools to aid in this fight against fraud and abuse of Medicare, Medicaid, the Children’s Health Insurance Program and private insurance plans. Key tools and accomplishments under the law include —

Use of state-of-the-art fraud-detection technology;
Expansion of policing for fraud and abuse to include Medicaid, Medicare Advantage and Medicare Part D programs;
Greater collaboration and information sharing among government entities (including states);
Enhanced screening and other enrollment requirements;
New focus on compliance and prevention with historically questionable providers and suppliers;
New durable medical equipment requirements;
Expanded overpayment recovery efforts;
Greater oversight of private-insurance abuses; and
Tough new rules and sentences for criminals who commit healthcare fraud.

HEAT's continued use of these new and/or improved tools, to attack healthcare fraud and abuse should result in more record-breaking recoveries down the road. Criminals and would-be criminals have been warned.

WeComply's Medicare Compliance training course teaches healthcare organizations and their employees to recognize and respond to healthcare fraud, waste and abuse, as well as code-of-conduct issues that arise in the workplace.

Burger King Sexual-Harassment Case Settles for $150,000

Wed, 02 May 2012 14:47:59 GMT

A Burger King franchisee agreed to pay $150,000 to a former employee to settle a sexual-harassment lawsuit brought by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). According to the lawsuit, a supervisor repeatedly harassed a teenage crew member. The crew member complained to management but, according to the lawsuit, her complaints were ignored. She finally quit in order to protect herself.

In addition to paying $150,000, the franchisee, which operates about 30 Burger King restaurants, agreed to submit regular reports to the EEOC about any sexual harassment complaints, to institute a comprehensive non-discrimination policy and complaint procedure, and to conduct training for staff and management.

In the Burger King case, the harassment allegedly continued for two years. According to the EEOC, the crew member, who was 17 years old when she started working at the Oregon restaurant, was “relentlessly” pursued by her older, married supervisor. The harassment included both outrageous comments, including asking her how much she charged for sex, and unwanted touching. The supervisor followed the crew member around the store and into the parking lot during her breaks. He ordered her not to complain to management.

“This case involved serious allegations of sexual harassment and the failure to protect a young worker,” an EEOC spokesperson said. “Companies across this region must realize that they will be held liable for the mistreatment of their employees by their managers.”

Employee training is a critical step in preventing and stopping sexual harassment. WeComply’s online sexual harassment training courses for employees and managers, including special courses for supervisors in California, Connecticut and Canada, teach employees the crucial concepts they need to know to recognize real-world issues and respond to them appropriately.

Medicare-Compliance-Training-Courses-Classes

Thu, 03 May 2012 17:45:04 GMT

Online Medicare Compliance Training Course

Medicare Fraud, Waste and Abuse

It's estimated that 3% to 10% of all healthcare-related spending — some $67 billion to $230 billion — is lost to fraud, waste or abuse each year. Indeed, healthcare fraud is believed to be the second largest white-collar crime in the U.S.

Medicaid Services (CMS) requires organizations that provide healthcare or administrative services for Medicare-eligible individuals under a Medicare Advantage (Part C) or prescription-drug plan (Part D) to train all employees annually on compliance awareness, conflicts of interest, and the prevention of fraud, waste and abuse.

Medicare Compliance Training Course Summary

This one-hour course (i) provides an overview of the Medicare system, (ii) outlines the Compliance Plan required by CMS, (iii) reviews the rules on conflicts of interest and business gifts, and (iv) explains how employees can help detect, correct and prevent fraud, waste and abuse. The topics covered in this course include —

What is Medicare?
CMS compliance essentials
Overview of the Compliance Plan
Employee responsibilities
Penalties for noncompliance
Conflicts of interest
Giving and receiving gifts and business courtesies
Overview of Medicare fraud, waste and abuse
Types of fraud
Anti-fraud laws
Penalties for fraud
Reporting violations

Get online access to the WeComply Medicare Compliance Training Course. Just complete the sign-up form on the right to begin your free course evaluation.

EEOC Issues New Guidance on Use of Criminal Records in Employment Decisions

Wed, 02 May 2012 14:44:44 GMT

On April 25, 2012, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) issued new enforcement guidance, on the use of criminal records in employment decisions under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The guidance consolidates and supersedes policy statements that were last issued in 1990.

While Title VII does not prohibit employers from obtaining the criminal records of job applicants or employees, it does prohibit employment discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, religion or sex. Therefore, an employer may be engaging in unlawful discrimination if, for example, it treats criminal-history information differently for different applicants or employees based on their race or other protected characteristics, or (in some situations) if the employer’s hiring policies based on criminal records have a disparate impact on individuals protected under Title VII.

The new guidance discusses —

How an employer’s use of criminal-history information could violate Title VII’s prohibition against employment discrimination
How federal court decisions have applied Title VII analysis to criminal-records exclusions
How disparate-treatment and disparate-impact analyses apply to the use of criminal history information
Other federal laws and regulations that limit the employment of individuals with specified criminal records
Best practices for employers to consider when making employment decisions based on criminal history

The new EEOC guidance provides more in-depth analysis than the previous policy statements but, according to the EEOC’s published questions and answers, it is not changing its fundamental positions on Title VII and criminal-records exclusions.

WeComply’s preventing discrimination and harassment training course covers the crucial issues employees and managers need to know to avoid unlawful discrimination. The questionable interview questions course covers topics that employees involved in recruiting, interviewing and hiring need to know to avoid discrimination.

EEOC Vows Crackdown on Discrimination against Pregnant Women and Caregivers

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 18:06:53 GMT

Since 2001, there have been more than 52,000 pregnancy-discrimination claims, and employers have paid more than $150 million to plaintiffs in cases brought by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), according to testimony at a recent EEOC hearing. Three-quarters of the pregnancy-discrimination cases claimed unlawful firing, and 10% claimed unlawful failure to hire.

Even though the Pregnancy Discrimination Act has been in effect for more than 30 years, significant discrimination still exists. The problem potentially affects many workers. According to testimony at the hearing, women make up 47% percent of the workforce and are the primary or co-primary providers in two-thirds of all families. There has been a significant increase, over the last 40 years, in the number of women who choose to work while pregnant and while in the later stages of pregnancy.

The hearing also focused on discrimination against workers who had caregiving responsibilities, which is also a problem that potentially affects a large number of workers, especially as the U.S. population gets older. Within the past five years, 42% of U.S. workers provided care for an aging relative or friend, and almost half of U.S. workers are expect to do so in the next five years.

The EEOC said it is committed to vigorous enforcement of the anti-discrimination laws as they apply to pregnant women and caregivers

WeComply’s online preventing discrimination training courses provide essential training for managers and non-managerial employees to help employers prevent workplace discrimination and harassment.

Supreme Court to Hear Copyright Case on Resale of Works Produced Outside the U.S.

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 17:36:09 GMT

To help pay for school, a mathematics graduate student from Thailand studying in the U.S. asked friends and relatives who lived abroad to buy cheap foreign editions of textbooks and send them to him so he could resell them on eBay. A New York court found that the student had committed copyright infringement and awarded the publisher $75,000 in damages for each book, for a total of $600,000. The Second Circuit upheld the decision. Recently, the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case.

The Supreme Court’s decision is expected to have a significant impact on e-commerce. eBay, along with several large technology trade groups, filed a friend-of-the-court brief, which stated, “The Second Circuit’s rule substantially threatens the increasingly important e-commerce sector of the economy, particularly secondary market e-commerce.”

At issue is whether the first sale doctrine, which allows purchasers of copyrighted works to resell them, applies to works that are produced outside the U.S., but imported into and resold in the U.S. There is a three-way split in how the Circuit Courts have answered this question, with the Second Circuit saying that copyrighted works can never be resold in the U.S. without the permission of the copyright holder, the Ninth Circuit saying that they sometimes can be resold, if the copyright owner authorized a previous sale in the U.S., and the Third Circuit saying that they always can be resold, as long as the copyright holder authorized the original overseas sale.

Two years ago, the Supreme Court reviewed the Ninth Circuit’s decision, but the Court split 4-4, with Justice Kagan not voting. She will be participating in this case, though, which will be heard in the fall.

WeComply’s Patents, Trademarks and Copyrights training course uses interactive teaching tools to explain the fundamental concepts of intellectual property.

Report: Wal-Mart Subsidiary Bribed Government Officials in Mexico

Fri, 27 Apr 2012 20:25:21 GMT

A recent examination into Wal-Mart's Mexican subsidiary by the New York Times revealed that the discount retailer's leaders sat on reports of bribery and corruption at Wal-Mart de Mexico.

In 2005, a whistleblower who had worked for Wal-Mart de Mexico e-mailed a Wal-Mart lawyer and described numerous instances in which Wal-Mart de Mexico executives paid bribes to speed up construction permits, obtain confidential information or make fines disappear. The e-mail triggered an internal investigation that uncovered records showing that $24 million in corporate funds may have gone to pay bribes. The records also showed that senior-level Mexican executives knew what the money was for, and hid the bribes from executives at Wal-Mart headquarters in Arkansas.

After the chief investigator reported to Wal-Mart's leadership that the conduct may have broken anti-corruption laws, corporate leaders in the United Stateschose to stop the investigation. They promoted an executive believed to have been primarily responsible for the bribes.

Wal-Mart has been successful in Mexico: One in five Wal-Mart stores is in that country. Through the years, Wal-Mart has touted the success of its Mexican subsidiary in presentations to investors, citing its "outstanding results" in the Central American country. The Times' examination raises questions about how much of the company's growth in Mexico can be attributed to construction permits that the company may have obtained in exchange for bribes. According to the Times, officials often granted permits and lifted restrictions within days or weeks of receiving payments.

Company critics have suggested that Wal-Mart should have engaged an independent investigator and reported the bribes to authorities as violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. Wal-Mart had retained law firms with FCPA experience in the past to investigate other suspicious dealings, but used an internal team to look into events in Mexico.

Former IHOP Managers Sue, Alleging Anti-Muslim and Anti-Arab Discrimination

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 18:09:16 GMT

Four long-time IHOP managers sued their employer, alleging that they had been verbally abused and fired because of their ethnicity and religion. All worked in the Dallas-Fort Worth area for the same franchise owner, all were fired within an eight-month period, and all were replaced by Caucasian non-Muslim managers.

The four men were originally hired by a franchise owner whose son took over operation of the restaurants around the end of 2009. According to the lawsuit, the son “put increased pressure and scrutiny on the managers who were of Arab-ethnic origin and the Muslim faith,” and fired the four plaintiffs one by one.

The lawsuit also alleges offensive remarks that started even before the owner’s son took over. The plaintiffs are suing for back pay, front pay and lost compensation and benefits.

National-origin discrimination occurs when employees or job applicants are treated unfavorably because they are from a particular country or part of the world, because of their ethnicity or accent, or because they are wrongly believed to have a certain ethnic background. National-origin discrimination can also involve unfavorable treatment towards someone married to or otherwise associated with someone of a particular natural origin, and it can occur even if both the person who is discriminating and the target of discrimination have the same national origin.

Religious discrimination occurs when employees or job applicants are treated unfavorably because of their religious beliefs. The EEOC says that the law protects “not only people who belong to traditional, organized religions, such as Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, and Judaism, but also others who have sincerely held religious, ethical or moral beliefs.” As with national-origin discrimination, religious discrimination can involve someone who is married to or associated with someone of a particular religion.

WeComply offers separate courses for managerial and nonmanagerial employees in preventing discrimination and harassment, providing essential training in critical compliance issues.

Ninth Circuit: Regular Attendance is "Essential Function" of Neo-Natal Nurse’s Job

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 17:29:54 GMT

A neo-natal intensive care nurse sued her hospital employer, claiming that her employer should allow her to take extra unplanned absences as an accommodation under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Under the ADA, an employer must provide reasonable accommodations that enable a qualified individual with a disability to perform the essential functions of the position. In this case, the hospital did not dispute that the nurse was disabled and that she had the technical skills to perform the job. However, the Ninth Circuit said, the nurse ran into “an insurmountable hurdle … in arguing that regular attendance is not an essential function of [her] position.”

The court said it was a “common-sense notion” that regular on-site job attendance was an essential function of the nurse's job. “Both before and since the passage of the ADA, a majority of circuits have endorsed the proposition that in those jobs where performance requires attendance at the job, irregular attendance compromises essential job functions.” In general, the court said, regular on-site attendance is necessary in jobs where employees work as part of a team, where jobs require face-to-face interaction, or where employees work with equipment or items on-site.

The court concluded that the nurse’s “performance is predicated on her attendance" and that her employer "need not provide accommodations that compromise performance quality — to require a hospital to do so could, quite literally, be fatal.”

WeComply’s online ADA course explains key concepts of the Americans with Disabilities Act to employees to give them the practical knowledge they need to spot and deal with everyday issues.

Business Gifts and Courtesies Course Now Available from WeComply

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 18:55:01 GMT

April 26, 2012 (Mount Kisco, N.Y.) -- WeComply, Inc., a leader in web-based ethics and compliance training for corporate employees, has announced the release of a new "Business Gifts and Courtesies" training course. This course teaches employees about giving and receiving gifts, meals, entertainment and other courtesies in the business context.

The course begins with an overview of the three main types of business courtesies and a discussion of the general considerations of appropriate gift-giving. It provides detailed guidelines for giving and receiving specific types of business courtesies in various contexts. In addition, the course offers direction for handling questionable gift-giving situations.

“Certain business courtesies, such as meals, gifts and entertainment, can help cement strong relationships with clients, vendors and other partners,” said Mike Pallatta, WeComply CEO. “However, giving or receiving inappropriate business courtesies can have negative consequences. It’s crucial that employees understand the boundaries of corporate gift-giving so they don't inadvertently place a business partner in an awkward position or, worse yet, offer a courtesy that may be perceived as a bribe or kickback.”

For more information on WeComply’s Business Gifts and Courtesies course, please visit http://www.wecomply.com/ethics-training/785318-business-courtesies-compliance-training-courses-classes.

About WeComply
WeComply is a leading provider of customizable online ethics and compliance training solutions, offering more than 70 courses on such topics as anti-corruption, antitrust, Code of Conduct, data privacy and security, discrimination and harassment, insider trading and whistleblowing. For more information, visit www.wecomply.com.

Payday Lender Ordered to Pay $56,500 for Firing Employee with Bipolar Disorder

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 20:52:02 GMT

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) prohibits unfavorable treatment of qualified employees with disabilities because of their disabilities. Recently, the EEOC prevailed in one of its first trials involving discrimination against an employee with bipolar disorder.

The court found that the employer, which owns and operates a chain of payday stores, fired the employee because it thought the employee was too disabled to work, and that the company’s stated reasons for firing the employee were pretexts used to cover up discrimination.

Initially, the employee had been very successful within the company. Within a few months of being hired as an assistant manager, he was promoted to store manager and received an award for his store’s success. Several months after that, he asked for a short leave to adjust to a new prescription medication used to treat his bipolar disorder. According to the employee, the employer denied his request, forcing him to return to work too soon. ,He was fired shortly after that.

An EEOC spokesperson said, “The court sent an important message today that employers can’t substitute fiction for facts when making employment decisions about disabled workers. Employers acting on outdated myths and fears about disabilities need to know that the EEOC will not shy away from taking ADA cases to trial to bring them into the 21st century.”

The court entered a judgment of $6,500 for back wages and $50,000 for emotional pain and suffering, as well as ordering the company to train its managers and HR staff on anti-discrimination and anti-retaliation laws.

WeComply’s online discrimination and harassment training courses use interactive features to help employees master the essential aspects of anti-discrimination law so that they can recognize and respond appropriately to issues that arise in the workplace.

Americans-with-Disabilities-Act-ADA-Title-II-Compliance-Training-Courses-Classes

Tue, 24 Apr 2012 16:50:09 GMT

Online ADA Title II Training Course

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) is a law that protects the civil rights of individuals with disabilities. State and local governments are required by Title II of the ADA to provide access to public programs, activities and services in ways that do not discriminate against people with disabilities. All government employees need to understand how to appropriately serve and include people with disabilities.

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) enforces Title II through an initiative called "Project Civic Access." The DOJ ensures that counties, cities, towns and villages comply with Title II of the ADA by eliminating physical and communication barriers that prevent people with disabilities from participating fully in community life. DOJ investigators, attorneys and architects survey state and local government facilities and programs across the country to identify modifications needed to comply with ADA requirements.

ADA Title II Training Course Summary

This training course provides a comprehensive guide to Title II of the ADA that will help communities understand and comply with their obligations. The online ADA Title II training course includes pop quizzes, news clippings and a final quiz highlighting real-world compliance issues that government workers should learn to recognize and deal with appropriately. The topics covered in the ADA training course include –

The history of the ADA
The legal framework of the ADA
Title II coverage and enforcement
Providing non-discriminatory services
Equal program access
Integrated settings
Effective communication practices
Construction and alteration of facilities
Modifying policies and procedures
Eliminating physical barriers
Reviewing program requirements
Appropriate signage
Auxiliary aids
Fundamental alterations
Undue burdens
Technical assistance

Get online access to the WeComply ADA Title II Training Course. Just complete the sign-up form on the right to begin your free course evaluation.

EEOC Issues New Rule on Age-Discrimination Claims

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 20:49:27 GMT

The EEOC issued a new rule, effective April 30, 2012, that allows employers to defend against disparate-impact age-discrimination claims by showing that the practices involved are based on “reasonable factors other than age (RFOA).” Disparate-impact practices are those that do not involve intentional discrimination but are more harmful to workers age 40 and over than to younger workers. The RFOA regulation applies only to disparate-impact claims; it does not apply to claims of intentional age discrimination.

The EEOC issued the new rule in response to two Supreme Court cases. Under the previous rule, employers defending against disparate-impact age-discrimination claims had to show that they had a business necessity for their practices. The new rule, which replaces the business-necessity defense with the RFOA defense, is favorable to employers because it's easier to show RFOA than to show business necessity.

The rule lists considerations to assess whether a factor is reasonable. Among the considerations are —

The extent to which the factor is related to the employer’s stated business purpose;
The extent to which the employer defined the factor accurately and applied it fairly and accurately;
The extent to which the employer assessed the adverse impact of the factor on older workers;
The degree of harm to workers in the protected group; and
The extent to which employers gave their managers and supervisors guidance or training on how to apply the factor and avoid discrimination.

WeComply’s online discrimination and harassment training courses give employees the practical information they need in this frequently changing area of the law.

Apple's E-book Pricing Method Spotlighted in DOJ Lawsuit

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 20:45:55 GMT

In just a few years, e-books have revolutionized the publishing industry. New legal issues have accompanied the transformation. Currently in the legal spotlight are the methods that publishers and booksellers use to set e-book prices. Two basic methods have emerged:

The wholesale method, used by Amazon, where booksellers negotiate with publishers on price and then sell the books at retail for whatever price they want, and
The agency method, used by Apple, where the publishers determine the price that consumers pay by setting a fixed price for books, with booksellers taking a fixed percentage.

Now, the Department of Justice (DOJ) is taking aim at the agency method, claiming that it violates antitrust law. On April 11, the DOJ filed a civil antitrust lawsuit against Apple and five of the six largest trade publishers in the U.S. Specifically, the DOJ claims that the defendants conspired to raise the prices that consumers pay for e-books and to eliminate competition among booksellers. The complaint alleges that the publishers conspired to raise e-book prices in order to force Amazon to raise its e-book prices. The complaint also alleges that the publishers agreed to pay Apple a 30% commission and promised Apple — in a “most favored nation” provision — that no other bookseller would sell e-books at a price lower than Apple’s.

Three of the five publishers agreed to settle on the same day the complaint was filed. The settlement agreement, if approved, will require the publishers to end their agreements with Apple and to refrain for two years from making new agreements prohibiting bookseller discounting. The settlement agreement will also impose a ,strong antitrust compliance program on the publishers.

In a press conference, a DOJ official said that the DOJ filed the lawsuit to protect consumers: “With [this] lawsuit, we are sending a clear message that competitors, even in rapidly evolving technology industries, cannot conspire to raise prices. We want to undo the harm caused by the companies’ anticompetitive conduct and restore retail price competition so that consumers can pay lower prices for their e-books.” The DOJ’s action is controversial: Some authors and other observers say that eliminating the agency pricing method will give Amazon the power to undercut brick-and-mortar bookstores.

WeComply’s online antitrust essentials training course guides employees through the complexities of antitrust laws and regulations, using multimedia teaching tools to help employees learn to recognize and appropriately deal with real-world compliance issues.

TI Automotive

Thu, 19 Apr 2012 18:51:56 GMT

Smartphones Blur Lines between Work and Time Off

Thu, 19 Apr 2012 18:46:10 GMT

With cell phones, smartphones, tweeting and texting, it's easy to remain connected to work 24/7. While employers and workers may appreciate the flexibility this connectivity provides for travel and off-site work, the constant call of mobile devices can sometime blur the line between work time and personal time. The situation creates a challenge for employers who must comply with wage-and-hour laws.

The trend has intensified during the economic downturn, when cost-cutting layoffs have meant extra work for many employees. At the same time, mobile devices have become more affordable, and employers sometimes offer BlackBerrys and iPhones so that employees can access their e-mail from home. In addition, employers have redefined jobs as "exempt" to avoid paying overtime — and employees are pushing back.

One Chicago police officer recently spoke to reporters about how he spends his time off. He described evenings spent answering calls and texts until 10:00 p.m. on weeknights. He spoke about missing his children's games and other events so he could put together search warrants and conduct police business. He eventually filed a wage-and-hour class action lawsuit against his employer, seeking back pay for overtime worked from 2007 through 2010. The city's lawyer says that it pays its officers overtime and that the officer in question spent an insignificant amount of time answering calls while off duty.

Wage-and-hour officials are also scrutinizing employers' classifications of workers as exempt or non-exempt. Retail employees at a Florida big-box store allege that their employer gave them managerial titles and took away their overtime pay, even though one "manager's" duties include running the cash register, unloading delivery trucks and keeping the store looking good. White-collar workers are faring no better. A group of mortgage bankers has filed a class-action lawsuit alleging that they had to work unpaid overtime in order to meet their sales quotas.

Until the law catches up with technology, it is essential for employers to train supervisors, managers and HR personnel on wage-and-hour rules and regulations and worker classification to help ensure compliance with employment laws.