Reduction in pay for employee who never schedule back

We are a very small business. Here’s my situation: I hired a new employee. One of my tenured employees came in on a weekend (I did pay them both)to help her get comfortable/train, etc before her start date, Monday. She started and...On day 2 she had to leave to take her daughter to Dr appt, Day 6 she left early saying daughter was in hospital- she lied about job responsibilities being completed and I had to pay other staff additional hours to complete. Then Day 7 She sent me a text saying she would not be in due to family emergency. When after 3 days she had not returned to work, I contacted her. She indicated she did not know definitely when she could come back. At this point I shared that I could not hold her position open as we are a VERY SMALL office. It was her decision to say she was “quitting”. My question is: do I have any ability to either lower her pay to minimum-wage or hold some of her pay out and not pay her to re-coop some of my losses for training, etc. This would be her first and only check with us. Thank you!

1 answer  |  asked Apr 12, 2019 06:01 AM [EST]  |  applies to Ohio

Answers (1)

Neil Klingshirn
You should not reduce your employee's pay for hours that the employee already worked, and you should definitely not lower it below the minimum wage. Doing so would expose your business to claims for breach of contract and claims under Ohio's prompt wage payment act and Ohio and US minimum wage laws. The prompt payment act has penalties, the Ohio and US minimum wage laws require the employer to pay the employee's legal fees if the employee wins, and it is not a defense to any of these claims that the employee performed poorly and had terrible attendance.

Your best response is to cut your losses and end the employment relationship. Holding back her pay could make a bad situation worse.

posted by Neil Klingshirn  |  Apr 14, 2019 08:59 AM [EST]

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