There are hundreds of factors that go into answering that question. What is my guaranteed salary? Do I get overtime? How much PTO am I entitled to? Am I guaranteed severance? Unfortunately, there are lot of more troubling questions to be asked as well. Are they shaving my hours? Where are my tips going? Are these deductions legal?
Quite often the best way to answer any question is to get all of the information in front of you. Luckily the state of Massachusetts provides you with two great tools to do just that. Massachusetts has two statutes, The Massachusetts Personnel Records Law and the Massachusetts Payroll Records Law that require an employer to provide you with certain records. The Personnel Records Law requires an employer to provide the employee’s “personnel record” which is defined as “a record kept by an employer that identifies an employee, to the extent that the record is used or has been used, or may affect or be used relative to that employee’s qualifications for employment, promotion, transfer, additional compensation, or disciplinary action.” The statute then goes on to say that your personnel record must contain documents regarding your rate of pay, job application, and other documents related to compensation. Why is this helpful? When starting a new job many of us sit down for a long time and sign document after document, not even knowing what we are signing. The problem is that those documents are incredibly important! Those documents that you sign at the beginning of a job often outline your rights, benefits, and responsibilities. If something goes wrong at work employers are often hesitant to send those documents over. However, the Personnel Records Law empowers an employee to request those documents. The employer must provide an opportunity for review within 5 business days. Once you get these documents in front of you most employees find out they have rights (and responsibilities) that they didn’t even know they had.
The Payroll Records Law is just as, and often even more, useful. The statute mandates that an employer keep “a true and accurate record” of “the amount paid each pay period to each employee” and “the hours worked each day and week by each employee.” If you translate this into English it entitles you to not only your paystubs, but something even more valuable for hourly employees. “The hours worked each day” part indicates that you can also request a record of your clock in and clock out times. That is a great way see whether you are actually being paid for all hours worked. Editing of clock in and clock out times is an unfortunately common way of shaving hours. For a restaurant employee who probably never checks their hours this can be great information to have.
Unfortunately, a sad reality is that many employers do not respond to employee’s requests. If you are having that problem feel free to contact Saban Legal Services and we can assist. If you already have the documents but are not sure what to do with them Saban Legal Services can offer an experienced eye for review. Information is power!
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