On October 26th, the House Education and Workforce Committee approved the Workforce Democracy and Fairness Act, H.R. 3094. The highlight of this act is that it will delay Union representation votes for a minimum of 35 days after employees submit a petition to unionize, compared to the 10-21 days the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) proposed in June. The vote was approved 26-13 and was divided among party lines.
This comes just after the House approved H.R. 2587 in September. The Protecting Jobs from Government Interference Act prevents the NLRB from ordering employers to shut down, move plants or relocate work.
Update! On November 30th, 2011 the House passed this bill…it is now onto the Senate…stay tuned!
Have you ever had a suspicious feeling about a worker’s injury? Here are a few red flags to look for when identifying a potentially fraudulent worker’s comp claim…
* When an injury is reported just before a work stoppage of some kind- The employee may be looking for a way to continue getting a check in the mail.
* When an injury is reported early Monday morning (or in their scheduled week) and there are no witnesses- The employee may have injured themself at home or playing recreational sports and did not want the medical bills.
*Employee is new to the job- Although many injuries can happen when an employee is new and in the “learning curve,” some folks have no intention of doing the actual work and will do as little as necessary before filing a claim.
*Spotty work history
* When the employee is hard to reach on the phone- Give employees a call to see how they are doing. The good employees will appreciate your concern. Those filing a false claim may be hard to reach because they are not at home gaining their strength.
* If an employee changes doctors more than once- This may be a signal that the doctors are catching on to the employee’s false claim, so the employee keeps moving on in the hope they will find one that will buy in.
* When the employee’s version of events changes or they just do not know how something happened- Ask them what happened immediately after the alleged accident and then conduct a full investigation a day or so later. If the story changes, it may not be the truth.
Most importantly, it is crucial to conduct full investigations after each and every incident to help prevent them from happening again. If you find a fraudulent claim in the process, you could potentially save a lot more!
Effective January 1st, 2012 employers in the state of Pennsylvania will be required to withhold local earned income taxes from all employees based on the employee’s location of residency. Employees will be required to complete a Residency Certification Form for the employer any time they are newly hired or have a change of name and/ or address. Employers must register their business with the tax collection district, retain the Residency Certification Form for each employee, send the local tax to the tax collector’s office on a monthly or quarterly basis, and complete and submit the Annual Withholding Reconciliation Form within 30 days of the end of each calendar year.
Forms are available from Alternative HR and the list of tax collection districts are available on the web at http://www.newpa.com.
Last Thursday, the National Labor Relations Board postponed the date they will require most employers in the country to hang the poster on collective bargaining rights to January 31, 2012. As a reminder, the poster can be found on the Department of Labor’s website (www.dol.gov) and needs to be 11×18 inches in size.
Follow Us!