Responding to Employee Complaints About Pay
Handling Employee Complaints About Pay"Complaints about pay" could cover a broad range of things. Employees may simply feel they are not paid enough- so long as you are meeting minimum wage requirements, you have no legal obligation to address those complaints (though depending on the situation you may need to in order to keep a valued employee).
You may also hear a complaint that someone is not being paid equally to someone else who does a similar job. In general, you are allowed to pay people differently. BUT- if the comparison is between employees of different genders, you will want to get advice about the Equal Pay Act. Finally, an employee complaint about any wage and hour violations- not being paid on time, not receiving earned commissions, not being paid as a W-2 employee- is protected activity under Massachusetts law. If any action is taken against that employee that could be seen as motivated by their complaint, you could face a retaliation suit. If you have employee complaints or grievances about pay, it is a good idea to consult with an employment lawyer to determine the best way to respond. Learn more here about employee complaints about pay. |
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Meet Our Employment Lawyers
Emily Smith-Lee is the owner and founder of slnlaw. She is a 1996 graduate of Boston College Law School. She was previously a partner at the Boston office of a large international firm, where she worked for thirteen years before starting the firm that became slnlaw in 2009. She has been recognized as Massachusetts Superlawyer each year since 2013, and in 2018 earned recognition as one of Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly's Lawyers of the Year. She has written a book on employment law: Rules of the Road, What You Need to Know About Employment Laws in Massachusetts, and helped thousands of clients on both the employee and employer side with severance and non compete review and negotiation, wage and hour, discrimination and retaliation disputes, and advice about employment law generally.
Rebecca Rogers: Rebecca is a 2006 graduate of Boston College Law School, and has worked with slnlaw since 2013. She previously worked as an intellectual property litigation attorney for Fish & Richardson in Boston, Massachusetts, and clerked for the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. Rebecca has helped clients with wage and hour disputes, employment discrimination and retaliation claims, review and negotiation of severance and non compete agreements, and advice to both employees and employers about navigating complex employment situations.
Jenna Ordway: Jenna is a 2013 graduate of Quinnipiac Law School, and also earned an LLM in Taxation from Boston University in 2015. She has been affiliated with slnlaw since 2011, first as a law clerk and then as an attorney. Jenna has been recognized since 2019 as a "Rising Star" by Massachusetts Superlawyers. Jenna has helped clients with review and negotiation of severance and non compete agreements, wage and hour disputes, employment and discrimination claims, and advice to small business owners about employment law and other business matters.
Elijah Bresley: Eli is a 2014 graduate of Seton Hall Law school, and has worked with slnlaw since 2020. He previously worked for a boutique employment law firm outside of Boston, and then for the Labor and Employment department of a large Boston firm. He also spent a year clerking for the judges of the Superior Court in Hartford, Connecticut. Eli has helped clients on the employee and employer side with all varieties of employment law issues, including employment discrimination, retaliation, and wage and hour issues, litigation in MCAD and state and federal courts, and advising employers about employment policies and practices.
Sharleen Tinnin: Sharleen is a 2010 graduate of Northeastern University School of Law, and has been with slnlaw since 2023. Prior to joining slnlaw, she worked with King, Tilden, McEttrick & Brink, P.C. on complex civil litigation matters. She previously worked for the United States Department of Justice, and received an "Excellence in Justice" award in 2017. Sharleen has helped clients with wage and hour, discrimination and retaliation disputes, review and negotiation of severance agreements, and litigation in MCAD and state and federal courts on employment related issues.