Human Resource Blog

You should consider carefully before taking this step, because there are several disadvantages. Some Texas employers already have a policy in place that would permit this. If you do not, we do not recommend that you implement it.

Texas has no law that requires an employer to pay an employee for unused vacation at termination. However, if you agree to this measure, that is essentially what you are doing — you are paying the employee for any unused vacation at termination. You are also setting a precedent, which will allow all other employees in the company to do the same. So you are basically establishing a permanent policy that you will pay employees for unused vacation at termination. Financially, this could be a very expensive policy.

You are also decreasing the amount of notice that employees are expected to give you. If the employee gives you two weeks notice but takes vacation one week, you are really only being given one weeks notice. If you implemented this policy, an employee with two weeks of vacation could quit the same day, and use the two weeks instead of giving notice. It is usually in the companys best interest for employees to give two weeks notice, so we would suggest that you do not approve this vacation.

However, there are no relevant federal or Texas laws on the subject, so your decision is a matter of company policy rather than employment law.

You can simply tell the employee that you cannot approve a vacation request during his last few weeks of employment (employers in every state have the right to schedule vacations at a convenient time.) Or, you can tell the employee that his employment will end on his last work day (Aug. 12) and ex-employees are not entitled to vacation payment.

Yes, as an employer you absolutely must pay employees for all hours worked. Under the federal FLSA or Fair Labor Standards Act, an employee must be paid for all hours *suffered or permitted to work*. This basically means that even if the employee works without your permission, or against your express orders, the employee must be paid. If the employee worked more than 40 hours per week — even without the employers permission — the employee would be entitled to overtime.

You can discipline or terminate an employee for working extra hours, over and above what is on the schedule, but you must pay the employee for all hours worked.

Yes, as an employer you can require that the employee remian on the premises for unpaid meal breaks in most states except California. As long as the employee is relieved of work duties, he or she need not be paid for the meal break.

Different rules apply if the meal break is shorter than 20 minutes.

If the employee is covered under the FMLA, or you are willing to put her back to work after the baby is born, this would be unwise and possibly illegal.

The employee is asking you to help her commit unemployment fraud. She wants to stay home with her baby but collect unemployment, by pretending that you have laid her off due to lack of work. You should decline to do so, because it is unethical, and it will increase your unemployment taxes.

If you are covered by the FMLA, the employee is entitled to be returned to her job after 12 weeks. If you do not return her to her job, you are in violation of the law. Assuming that she is physcially able to return, and declines, she would not qualify for unemployment.

Suppose you are not covered by FMLA, but are willing to put this employee back to work after her childbirth disability ends. If she declines because she wants to stay home with her baby, she has quit. That is certainly the employees right, but then she would not qualify for unemployment benefits. 

On the other hand, if you are not covered by FMLA and not willing to put the employee back to work after an absence of 6 to 8 weeks, then yes, you are laying her off. Once she is healthy again, she will qualify for unemployment benefits.

Many employees think that unemployment benefits are free money. In fact, in most states, the more former employees you have who collect unemployment, the higher the unemployment tax for your company will be.

Any employee can be paid by salary, but that does not necessarily make the employee exempt. Under the federal FLSA or Fair Labor Standards Act, an employee must meet certain requirements for job duties to be exempt. If your employees do not meet those requirements, then they are entitled to overtime when they work more than 40 hours in the payroll week.

It sounds like the owner wants to put all the employees on salary. An employer can legally do this. It makes calculating payroll much easier in situations where most employees work 40 hours per week. However, the employee is still entitled to overtime after 40 hours. The non-exempt employees salary can also be prorated in any week in which the emplopyee works fewer than 40 hours.

An exempt or non-exempt employee who takes time off can be required to use vacation, sick leave or PTO for that time. When an employer has a bona fide paid sick leave policy, and the exempt employee takes additional days off after exhausting sick leave, the exempt employee need not be paid if he or she misses a full day of work. If the exempt employee works any time at all on that day, even 5 minutes, even checking email or taking a work-related phone call, the exempt employee is entitled to his or her full days wages.