The LAW Blog

What is Overtime? Generally, overtime constitutes any time worked over 40 hours in a single workweek. The Fair Labor Standards Act, or FLSA, entitles employees covered by the Act to receive time-and-a-half (1.5x their rate of pay) for overtime work. Employers must adhere to the FLSA standards, ensuring that eligible workers are compensated for overtime.…

LAW Partner Steve Wolfe and Associate Missy Torgerson filed a new lawsuit seeking unpaid overtime wages against regional employer Southeast Connections, LLC. You can read a copy of the Complaint, which is pending in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, here: 1-0 Collective Action Complaint. The lawsuit alleges that the plaintiffs, former…

Can My Employer Fire Me for Being Pregnant? Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VII) prohibits an employer with 15 or more employees from discriminating against or taking an adverse employment action against an employee because they are pregnant. Adverse employment actions include, but are not limited to, terminations. Unfortunately, some employers…

In a nation that prides itself on a “free market” system, noncompete agreements have become a way for employers to use the law to prevent fair and open competition. These contracts legally ban employees from working for their company’s competitors for up to two years after their employment ends – even if the employee is…

“Laid off,” “separated,” “let go,” or even “graduated” – these are all terms employers might use to describe ending employment relationships. These euphemisms are apparently intended to soften the blow for the employee and to ease the employer’s conscience, with varying degrees of success. Employers often explain a termination as a “business decision” aimed at goals like increasing efficiency or…

In mid-October, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Helix Energy Solutions Group, Inc. v. Hewitt, a case that asks whether a highly paid employee with supervisory duties is nevertheless entitled to overtime pay under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) because he was paid a flat, daily rate instead of a salary. Michael Hewitt worked as a…

Do I have to return to office work? It is no secret that the American workforce developed a preference for working from home during the COVID-19 pandemic. In a September poll conducted by Monster, two thirds of the 1,806 workers polled stated they would quit if forced to return to a full-time in-office schedule. But that…

Legare, Attwood & Ragan attorneys Steve Wolfe and Missy Torgerson represent the former COO of DeKalb County School District, Ben Estill. Mr. Estill alleges in his lawsuit that, within months of his arrival at DCSD, he discovered several serious issues involving misuse of public funds and violations of DCSD policies and reported the same to his…

In February 2022, LAW Partner Steve Wolfe and attorney Missy Torgerson reached a successful settlement for claimed unpaid overtime wages on behalf of their clients, a group of pipefitters. Wolfe and Torgerson worked on the case together with Lee Brigham of the law firm Bell & Brigham in Augusta, GA. They brought the lawsuit under the Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”),…

Victims of workplace sexual assault and harassment will now have their day in court. On February 10, 2022, Congress passed the Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Act, a bill that would end mandatory arbitration of workplace sexual assault and harassment cases and allow vitims to assert their claims in court.  The bill…