Employee earned leave and holidays

lisfir

I work at a small agency (29 employees). Over half of our staff consists of full-time (40 hours a week) drivers for a public transportation program. According to our policy, full-time staff earn paid annual leave, sick leave and holidays. Policy states that drivers are not eligible for these leave benefits, however, even though they work 40 hours and are considered full-time, permanent employees. This certainly does not seem fair and I am wondering if it is legal.

NaeNae55

You can set your benefit plans up pretty much any way you want to, though there are limits for some highly comped employees and you cannot do any kind of illegal discrimination.

What you are talking about is a 'class' of employee. You can certainly exclude them from your benefits. Whether it is fair or not is another matter. You might check to see why this was set up the way it is. There may be good reason, or it may be the reason no longer applies.

Good luck!

Nae

davids

Agree with Nae. One additional thing to look at is the protected class statuses of the two groups. Are the eligible employees predominantly one gender, ethnicity, age, etc. while the ineligible group is predominantly a different gender, ethnicity, age, etc. Although you may have a valid non-discriminatory reason why one group receives benefits and the other doesn't, if the impact of that rationale results in discrimination, you may want to revisit that rationale.

rweaver

I agree as well. You can do what you want, no laws against what you are doing. But, with the very liberal NLRB, you may invite your drivers to organize and if you aren't a union operation, you may become one. Your policy can certainly breed dissatisfaction and that often is the reason employers have earned unions.