• Mostly_Gristle@lemmy.world
    337·
    10 months ago

    No. That sounds like wage theft. If my boss pulled something like that I’d be on the phone with my state’s department of labor so freakin’ fast. If you worked the hours they have to pay you for it.

    Even if it weren’t illegal, it’d be a big flashing neon sign saying, “We will screw you over every chance we get, and you will be nothing but miserable working here.”

  • rockSlayer@lemmy.world
    187·
    10 months ago

    No, this both uncommon and illegal (assuming it’s from the US). They’re trying to couch their wage theft in legal jargon to scare the unwitting into accepting it

    • assassin_aragorn@lemmy.world
      5·
      10 months ago

      I don’t think it holds up in court even if you sign it. It’s why contracts usually have clauses that if part of it is found void the whole contract is not void. You can’t do something illegal because you made someone sign a contract for it.

  • Trainguyrom@reddthat.comEnglish
    131·
    10 months ago

    Others have heavily covered the legality portion of this but I want to point out one other key factor: any employer that tries to pull this kind of shit clearly has a significant employee retention problem, and they’re trying to fix it by trapping their employees financially rather than getting to the root of the problem.

    Refuse to sign this agreement and find another job. If they let you join without signing this agreement keep applying elsewhere because you’ll almost certainly learn very quickly why they have such a bad employee retention problem

      • gram_cracker@lemmynsfw.com
        15·
        10 months ago

        That’s probably only worth if your state has damages above and beyond what’s stolen from you; otherwise a lot of life hassle for a shitty job, which is what the deal was in the first place

    • ChickenLadyLovesLife@lemmy.worldEnglish
      11·
      10 months ago

      At my last company, when I joined they gave me an employee agreement to sign that not only granted to them the rights over any software that I developed while working for them even if it was personal projects that I did for myself on my own time (which is standard corporate bullshittery) but also granted to them rights over anything that I had developed in my entire life previous to working for them. I told them they had to be fucking kidding me (like, surely they should have understood that at a minimum that would conflict with the rights of my previous employers who I had developed stuff for) and refused to sign it. They ended up hiring me anyway, without my ever having signed any employee agreement at all - I got like weekly email reminders from HR about it for a year until they finally just stopped.

      • Trainguyrom@reddthat.comEnglish
        6·
        10 months ago

        That’s surprising that instead of striking the two clauses you objected to that just didn’t have you sign an employment agreement at all

  • DarkNightoftheSoul@mander.xyzEnglish
    98·
    10 months ago

    You don’t have to ask us. Contact your state’s attorney general and/or workforce commission directly. They’ll know.

    Edit: I speculate not. For one, my general understanding is “time worked is time paid.” You cannot be deducted pay for the cost of, for instance, mistakes.

    For two, I don’t think a contract that doesn’t benefit you in any way is enforceable.

    Edit3: The legal term I was thinking of here was Unconscionability

    You might start clandestinely recording conversations with your supervisors if that’s legal in your state, just in case they try to pull some “off the record” shenanigans when/if you blow the whistle.

    Edit2: There is a pretty good voice recording app in the fdroid repository. I’ve used “Simple Voice Recorder” from there, picked up good audio through my pants pocket, but your phone will vary and you should test the ability to record surreptitiously vs clearly before the recording is needed.

  • PM_Your_Nudes_Please@lemmy.world
    80·
    10 months ago

    It’s blatantly illegal, and the fact that they were dumb enough to put it in writing means you have a slam dunk case for your local department of labor. File a complaint, and let the DoL take it from there; The entire department exists to deal with bullshit like this, but they only act on complaints.

    • Mirshe@lemmy.world
      32·
      10 months ago

      Yup, this is highly illegal, and I’ll bet as soon as they crack open this company’s books, they’ll start finding all sorts of OTHER illegal shit. Companies dumb enough to put this in writing are also dumb enough to not stop at committing one crime at a time.

  • IvanOverdrive@lemm.ee
    64·
    10 months ago

    Russians have been know to burn places down as a form of protest.

    I don’t know why that just popped into my head.

    • rmuk@feddit.ukEnglish
      18·
      10 months ago

      Check out my ornamental slicing machine. It’s from France.

      Sorry, totally brain fart. You were saying?

    • Mirshe@lemmy.world
      4·
      10 months ago

      I’ll just point out that 2000 North Koreans in China killed their managers and occupied a factory for weeks over something similar.

  • Mistic@lemmy.world
    51·
    10 months ago

    Very much illegal where I live.

    Not to mention, if the company has to implement such practices, it means it has a problem retaining staff.

    If it has problems retaining staff and solves it not by addressing the underlying issues but by extortion, why would you work for such a company? Their management is clearly incompetent.

  • RBWells@lemmy.world
    51·
    10 months ago

    No. It is legal and usual to pay in arrears (you work 2 weeks then get your check a week later) but it’s not legal (even here in Florida where workers have few protections) to withhold pay for hours worked. That’s wage theft, and it’s epidemic in the United States.

    What job requires a security deposit?

    • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
      1·
      10 months ago

      In certain specific cases when one is working as a contractor, but never an employee, one may be required to put down a security deposit that would be returned upon completion of the contract.

    • fluckx@lemmy.world
      8·
      10 months ago

      Businesses can tell you from this point onward your wage will lower in the US?

      That can’t be legal can it? That’s a one sided change of contract.

      • JJROKCZ@lemmy.world
        6·
        10 months ago

        We don’t get employment contracts anymore, ever since every state passed “at will” employment laws. Companies can drop you at any time for any reason that isn’t one of a very small list ( racial discrimination, union retaliation, etc) with no notice to you beforehand. They also don’t need to provide any real proof for their reasons unless you file a lawsuit, there are plenty of stories of companies getting wind of possible unionism and they fire groups of people for being late occasionally or the location was underperforming when really it wasn’t.

  • something183786@lemmy.worldEnglish
    50·
    10 months ago

    If you are in the US, that’s likely very illegal. Wherever you are, talk to your state, Providence, federal, etc. labor board.

  • Rentlar@lemmy.ca
    45·
    10 months ago

    Those paragraphs read like a monetary version of a slave’s collar… disturbing.