Passing on contractor hours If company A contracts company B to be paid by the hour, and company B contracts an individual C, also paid by the hour, is it legal for company B to pass on the hours their own contractor C billed them for to company A is if the individual C were company B's employee? Real world example: a company is contracting a software development LLC for some development worked paid by the hour. The software development LLC wants to hire a tester via contract to test this software for a few hours. The softwere dev LLC pays their tester, then bills the hours the tester works on the client's project to their client. I know that companies bill their clients for hours their on-payroll employees worked, but my question is specifically whether or not the hours of one contractor can be passed on by another to their client for working on the client's project. Also, the question is regarding United States law.
Yes One of the major factors that distinguishes a contract relationship from an employment relationship is the ability of the contractor to sub-contract.
Not really. If you are doing the same work as an employee and are treated the same as an employee, then the IRS (for purposes like withholding) and the government for other purposes (like wage and hour or antidiscrimination laws) is going to treat you like an employee. There is a multi-factor test to determine if you are an independent contractor or an employee. If you are working as an employee, the test will show that you are one. Failing to treat you like one is illegal and has tax consequences. See, e.g., https://www.irs.gov/publications/p15/ar02.html#en_US_2016_publink1000202292
Contracts do not have to be written and signed on pieces of paper, except in a few cases specified by law. Writing style (ordinary style of talking vs. high-register formulaic language) does not affect the validity or a writing in contract law. You do have something in writing. What matters most is what he actually said (exact words, not your belief of what it must have meant), and how it relates to any existing contractual obligation. For example if the message says &quot;You're fired, turn your badge in at the desk. I'll think about giving you two weeks pay&quot;, that's not an enforceable promise. But your existing contract might say &quot;You get 2 weeks severance pay when we fire you&quot;, and that can't be walked by by saying &quot;I'll thinking about it&quot;. And it also depends on whether there are any laws mandating severance pay (but California does not have any mandatory severance pay law).
No The intent of the proposed bill is to codify existing case law. You are an employee now and you will be an employee then. You are an employee now because a) you are not free from the company's control and direction or b) the work you are doing is the company's main business. If you read the bill you will find out that c) involves "an independently established trade, occupation, or business" so your business qualifies for this but you need to qualify for all three factors to be an independent contractor.
It seems that this is known as a &quot;working interview&quot;. Asking a candidate to do actual work without paying for it is illegal under Texas law. However asking a person to take an extensive, even a multi-day, skills test is not. Asking a prospective web developer to submit a portfolio of prior work, or to design a web site for a fictional company, say for the Acme Company that supplies the Coyote, is legal. Had the applicant created a web site for the actual employer without being paid, the applicant would own the copyright, and the prospective employer would be in violation of Texas minimum wage law, and would have committed copyright infringement if they used the design, without securing permission. Statutory damages for wilful copyright infringement can be as high as $150,000, and as low as $750. A federal suit must be filed to collect such damages. However, if no actual work was done, I doubt that the applicant has a valid claim. One would need to consult a lawyer to see if some other basis for a claim would apply. Many lawyers will offer an initial consultation for free or a nominal charge. Here are some Texas sources on the issues with &quot;working interviews&quot;. The page &quot;Are “Working Interviews” Legal?&quot; from the Gay Reed law firm says: If you bring someone in for a working interview you must pay them for their time in compliance with state and federal law and make appropriate withholding. Some believe that since they are only going to be there for a few days, you don’t have to do new-hire paperwork. Just skip the I-9, background check, application, and W-2. Wrong again. If you hire anyone – for 1 day or 1,000, you have to do new hire paperwork. Depending on how long you would like to conduct your interview, we can create a day contract or a week contract for the prospective employee. This will limit your exposure under unemployment compensation laws, and you can even reduce the amount you pay. Where you might pay a good hygienist $20 per hour or more as a full time wage, you can pay them minimum wage during a working interview. The page &quot;What Is a “Working Interview” and How Does It Work? from CEDR HR Solutions says: A “working interview” is the act of assessing a job candidate’s skills and ability to fit with your existing team by bringing them in to perform work for your business temporarily before you officially bring them on board. Traditionally, working interviews take place after a successful verbal interview. ... However, using working interviews does not exempt you from your obligations as an employer, and performing working interviews without understanding their legal implications can actually get you in a lot of trouble. ... If your “interviewee” is performing work for your business that would usually be performed by one of your employees, in a legal sense, that person must be treated as an employee of your business. By testing your applicants’ abilities and knowledge without having them perform actual work for your business, you can get an idea of their skill level without putting your practice at risk. “Skills tests” are especially helpful when it comes to evaluating candidates for clinical positions. ... Instead of performing an unpaid working interview or trying to call someone an independent contractor when they do not fit those requirements, hire them and use a “Getting Acquainted” period to judge whether a new hire will be a long-term fit for your practice (90 days is often a good span of time for this). The Texas Workforce Commission (TWC) has a page on &quot;Interviews&quot; which says: Interviews When interviewing applicants, apply the same standard that is applied to job applications - ask only about things that are directly related to the job requirements for the position under consideration. Watch out for tape-recording - the applicant might be tape-recording the interview without an employer's knowledge, and a video- or tape-recording of an interview would be discoverable in a discrimination claim or lawsuit. Tell the managers who conduct interviews to be extremely careful about note-taking during interviews - anything like that can be discovered in a claim or lawsuit - many discrimination cases have been lost due to careless and/or embarrassing comments written by interviewers. Test for whether something should be written down: would you feel comfortable explaining it in front of a judge and jury? &quot;Working interviews&quot; are not the same as pre-hire interviews at which an interviewee might demonstrate how he or she would carry out a sample task - an &quot;interview&quot; during which the worker performs actual work and receives what most companies would call &quot;on the job&quot; training or orientation to the company is work time - a company must pay at least minimum wage for such training time, satisfy all of the usual new-hire paperwork requirements (W-4, I-9, new hire report, and so on), and report the wages to TWC and IRS. The TWC can be reached at: 512-463-2222 The TWC page on the minimum wage says that Texas uses the federal minimum wage of $7.25/hr. It lists several exceptions, none of which seem to apply to the situation described in the question, or rather the situation that would have occurred had the applicant accepted an &quot;unpaid trial&quot; or &quot;working interview&quot;. The actual Texas law is Chapter 62 of the Labor Code The exact section is 62.051.
Since this is a board about law, the legal answer is that New Jersey does not regulate vacation pay: In New Jersey, employers are not required to provide employees with vacation benefits, either paid or unpaid. If an employer chooses to provide these benefits, it is only required to comply with its established policy or employment contract. The specific law cited by that web page is this one, which says that &quot;Nothing in this chapter requires an employer to pay an employee for hours the employee is not required to be at his or her place of work because of holidays, vacation, lunch hours, illness and similar reasons.&quot; So whether your boss can count weekend days as part of your vacation will depend on your employment contract and the established policies of your employer. Unfortunately, that's not something this forum can provide advice on.
This seems to fall under the Federal Fair Labor Standards Act, and is defined as &quot;waiting time.&quot; From Employment Law Handbook: On-duty waiting time should be counted as hours worked. It is time spent by an employee, typically during normal work hours, waiting for direction from their team lead, supervisor, or manager. These on-duty waiting time periods usually last only for a short time and can be unpredictable as to when they occur and how long they will last. The employee is generally not allowed to leave the workplace during a period of on-duty waiting time. Essentially, because the employer benefits from having the employee available for immediate engagement in work and the employee is not otherwise able to use the time effectively for their own personal purposes, on-duty waiting time must be counted as hours worked. Examples of on-duty waiting time that should be counted as hours worked include a messenger waiting for his or her next assignment, a warehouse worker waiting for a truck to arrive, factory workers waiting for machinery to be fixed, and a firemen waiting for an emergency call. Each of these examples represents a situation where the hallmarks of on-duty waiting time are present: the employee is not engaged in the work for which they were hired; remains subject to the direction of his or her employer; is not able to effectively use the time for themselves; and is unsure as to when the waiting period will occur and/or how long it will last. Employees who work away from their employer’s place of business can also be on-duty while waiting for work. Repairmen for utility companies represent a good example of when workers may experience on-duty waiting time while away from the employer’s workplace. If a repairman must wait for a home or business owner to allow them into their premises or wait for a new service call to come in, that time should be counted as hours worked for purposes of minimum wage and overtime calculations.
The answer to your question is that your manager cannot ask you to undertake training without payment. All employees are entitled to be paid for the work they have done. They are also entitled to be paid if they are ready and willing to work but their employer has not provided them with any work to do, unless your employment contract says otherwise. https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/work/rights-at-work/rights-to-pay/ Zero hours contracts can be very complicated legal issues, but you are entitled to be paid for the time you spend there doing what your employer has asked you to do. However, if your employment were to be terminated due to a disagreement then you may not be able to make any claim before an Employment Tribunal as you do not yet have a sufficient length of employment. There are many legal complications, and each case is different and individual. Giving general legal advice is beset with all kinds of problems. You may wish to direct your employer to the Citizens' Advice page. If they do not agree to either pay you for your time there or allow you to leave when they do not wish to pay you then your best option might be to seek employment elsewhere.