Recent amendments to Title VII and the Fair Labor Standards Act impact how employers address the needs of pregnant and breastfeeding employees. Employers will want to reset their approaches to navigate these expanded statutory protections.
A North Carolina health plan’s refusal to cover gender dysphoria treatment violated the Affordable Care Act. According to this Law360 article, the December ruling by US District Judge Loretta C. Biggs is a win for participants and parents of transgender children enrolled in the North Carolina State Health Plan for Teachers and State Employees. McDermott’s Warren Haskel, Dmitriy Tishyevich and Lauren H. Evans represented the health plan’s participants.
US employers have grown increasingly interested in identifying incentives that increase COVID-19 vaccination among employees. The US Departments of Labor, Treasury and Human and Human Services recently issued guidance regarding the application of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPPA) wellness rules to vaccine-related premium surcharges and discounts, clarifying that employers may charge vaccine premium incentives if they adhere to the requirements of activity-only health-contingent programs. In this Employee Benefit Plan Review article, McDermott Partner Judith Wethall and McDermott Associate Sarah G. Raaii outline what this HIPPA guidance means for employers.
As more employers mandate vaccines for their workforces, in-house legal departments are encountering a host of challenges, including understanding religious accommodations and minimizing litigation exposure. According to this article published in Law.com, employers should have the ability to navigate Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and Title VII-related accommodation requests. However, McDermott Partner Carole Spink said many employers have never encountered the current breadth of religious exemption requests from their workforces.
As governments lift COVID-19 pandemic restrictions, employers are turning to artificial intelligence tools to accelerate their hiring processes.
However, these AI-based tools can open businesses up to discrimination claims if they are not careful, according to McDermott partner Brian Mead.
“[The technology] could decide that certain words [are] unlikely to [yield] successful candidates, and then it’s prescreening out members of protected classes and categories of applicants in a discriminatory way,” Mead said in a recent Law360 article.
President Joe Biden is expected to usher in a decidedly more worker-friendly environment than his predecessor, but whether Congress or the courts embrace similar pro-employee leanings over the next four years is anyone’s guess.
In a recent article for Law360, McDermott partner Daniel Doron weighs in on four top-of-mind questions about bias law that may soon be addressed under the Biden administration.
As the first doses of the COVID-19 vaccine are administered in the United States, employers have much to consider with regard to mandating the vaccine for their employees.
On December 16, 2020, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) issued its first direct guidance for employers regarding COVID-19 vaccines approved or authorized by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Important takeaways from the guidance, as well as FAQs from the EEOC, are discussed in the attached link.
Employers are contending with how to respond to telecommuters dressing down during the pandemic. Companies also are considering how to ensure dress codes don’t unlawfully discriminate or violate National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) rights.
In a recent article by the Society of Human Resource Management, McDermott Employment associate Philip Shecter advises employers to be mindful of these rights, which may arise in the context of attire in favor of social justice movements.
Class action litigation brought under the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) is on the rise—particularly in California—after the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit issued a 2017 decision applying a hypertechnical approach to the FCRA’s disclosure requirements. Background checks are an integral part of the hiring process, but they open employers up to lawsuits for noncompliance with disclosure or adverse action requirements. Plaintiffs’ firms are turning their attention to these cases because of the potential for statutory and actual damages, punitive damages, costs and attorneys’ fees. In our recent webinars, we discussed strategies to help employers avoid and defend these claims.
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