American here. I have a job where they have a perk where you submit receipts through their app or website and you earn points you can cash out at some point if you shop with clients of our company. Sounds like a nice little promotional incentive, right?
Well, they say it’s optional but it’s not. You can apparently get in trouble for not using this and we’ve been pulled aside about it and warned we must use this stupid thing.
The idea is the app you install must be given permission to see your location at all times. It then checks the area to ensure you are favoring clients of our company as opposed to our competitors when you shop. When you shop at one of our clients, you must report your receipt to the company showing everything you bought while there. Even if you are buying gas, you need to report it.
I don’t participate in this invasion of privacy. I actually want to put less of my data out there in general, not more. I don’t even have a grocery store discount card. We were told in a meeting this week that promotions in this company are influenced by how much/if you participate in the program. We were told people have been denied promotions because they did not participate in this program.
If I’m off the clock they don’t get to decide what I do. They can fuck themselves. And I am surely not giving them a little report of what I buy. But saying we are ineligible for career advancement within the company unless we buy groceries, gas, etc from preferred vendors seems sketchy. Is this legal?
When asking about laws, it is essential to say where you live. Different places have different laws. After a look through your recent posts, it appears you live in Ohio. These practices probably violate specific laws in Ohio.
One of them is ORC 2903.216 (B) (1), which prohibits causing a tracking device or application to monitor a person’s movement without their consent.
The other is ORC 1345.02 (A), which prohibits unfair or deceptive trade practices. It’s a bit more open to interpretation, but something makes me think a judge would not be amused.
Anyway, I’m not a lawyer, and it sounds like you need one. It’s not rare that lawyers offer free consultations to determine if you have a real case.
Well I don’t know what a lawyer would actually do for me here. I haven’t suffered any damages yet. Doesn’t it have to directly impact me first, then I would have a case? The whole thing is about things NOT happening to me, eg NOT getting promoted.
A lawyer could point you in the right direction. Not all legal action is necessarily “damages” (also, the lack of a promotion is damages—if your boss says to you “You’re my most skilled employee, but I don’t want to give you a promotion because you’re a woman”, that’s unlawful discrimination in any place that prohibits sexism. Of course in the vast majority of cases it is much harder to prove since the boss won’t actually explicitly say that, but you get the principle of the law); legal action can be to correct a wrong, in this case changing company policy to ensure that employees are not discriminated against on the basis of not using this app. You can just explain the situation over email to a law firm that deals with labour law, and if perhaps you’d be better served by a different law firm for instance, they will be able to point you in that direction.
A consultation with a lawyer will tell you what, if anything a lawyer will do for you. Pressure consisting of implied loss of opportunity is probably enough.
Alternately, you might not have a case, and a consultation will tell you that too.
This is lawyer territory. Randos on the internet will not be able to help.
Assuming this is real, you can potentially get quite a bit of money off this. Talk to an employment lawyer for free consultation and see if you can get terminated for not following this procedure. You’ll need to document evidence of the company pressuring you to use the app.
It doesn’t even have to be illegal for this to work. It only has to be unreasonably outside your job responsibilities.
Also worth noting that even just keeping a notebook with the date, time, and conversation details will be sufficient. That is admissible as evidence, and in a he-said-she-said scenario (which this would turn into, with you saying the employer denied your raise because of this and the employer saying it was for something different), the side with the notes will win 99% of the time.
Like go buy a cheap pocket notebook, and fill it in with as many details as you remember. Dates, times, specific instances of the company/management saying they’ll use the app to determine promotions, which specific manager said it, etc… Then just update the notebook every time it comes up again.
This sounds like a company store with extra steps. IANAL but it sounds extremely illegal for your employer to dictate what you do with your wages in any way, including linking it to career advancement. I highly doubt this is a union job, so your best bet might be to talk to a labor attorney. Do not talk to the company’s HR dept., because they don’t work for you; they work for your employer.
Agreed, the company is just waiting out a class action lawsuit where they will only end up paying 20% of what they’ve made as legal punishment; a scam old as time. I would wonder if they’ve put this in writing or could be recorded demanding the employees do these behaviors.
the last meeting was recorded but we can’t access the recordings. I might be able to snag a recording myself but then it becomes really cagey as to whether such evidence can but used so its a risk with no benefit.
In the event of legal action, your side can request disclosure from the other side. It’s standard to request disclosure of evidence the other side holds that will help your case, and in this case something like a meeting in which something said is important evidence, I’m sure that both your company’s lawyers and if not then a judge will get the company to hand over the recording.
Ohio is a single party consent state, so as long as at least one person in a conversation consents to being recorded, it is legal to record the conversation. And you can count as that single party. So as long as you participate in the conversation, you can record it without telling any other participants.
Just quietly set your phone to record a voice memo, and keep it nearby.
Are you on a single party state? If so you can record any meeting/conversation that you’re a part of.
THIS
Try to get this in writing, or document your day-to-day with this. Focus on the retaliation, the instances they tell you how you’re supposed to spend your money and maybe get coworkers to back you up and write that down.
The more clear evidence, the better. Lawyers love when you have a bunch of evidence in writing. Especially if it’s emails or similar directly from them that prove your case.
I’m not a lawyer either. But going off the company store insight, maybe we can look to the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938. It prohibits paying wages in scrip, or “similar devices”. Scrip can take a couple of forms; one is an internal company currency that can only be spent at the company store. That provision in the FLSA was specifically intended to shut down company store scams.
It seems that an implied condition of your work is spending some portion of your wages at certain stores. Since scrip is money that can only be spent in certain places, it might be argued that if you are required to spend a portion of your wages in certain places, that has the same effect as paying a portion of your wages in scrip.
Unfortunately after a bit of searching I haven’t seen this specific argument made. But again, I’m not a lawyer, and I don’t know how to research case law. It sounds like they’re trying to claim this program in optional, so it might be challenging to prove that participation is de facto mandatory.
I’m guessing if you could get someone to tell you a number for how much they expect you to spend in this program that would help with such an argument.On second thought, I don’t actually know how helpful a number would be, and I don’t want to get you in trouble.Unfortunately, company scrip is legal as long as they’re still paying at least minimum wage in USD. Like they can pay you $7.25 per hour (federal minimum wage, assuming your state doesn’t have a higher minimum wage) plus $92.25 per hour in company scrip. And they could claim that your wage is $100 per hour, because of the company scrip. It’s scummy, but technically legal.
Because at the time, minimum wage was actually intended to cover the cost of living (housing, utilities, food, and a single car) for a family of three. So as long as they were at least paying the minimum wage to cover your basic essentials, the scrip was legal. Nowadays, minimum wage has deflated to the point that it doesn’t even support one person. So the spirit of the FLSA’s company scrip section hasn’t been honored, as minimum wage has deflated.
What I hear when I hear “company store”.
And finally, a slightly more updated version
While others are focusing on the legal aspect, which I guess is the question you actually asked, my first thought was bare minimum compliance while gathering evidence. Grab an old phone, wipe it completely, install the app with all new credentials not tied to you in any way, then just leave it running at work. They get their location data, just not anything usable, you get to submit a minimum number of receipts that doesn’t get you in trouble from purchases you would have made anyway, or not because why support scumbag companies. You get to gather more hard evidence of their assholery that way. Never install work apps on your personal phone. If they require something for your job, they should provide the hardware to run it on.
European here, WTF?!
American here and still, WTF‽
That’s not a job that’s a scam
I don’t want to reveal enough to identify myself there but it’s absolutely a real company, a pretty big one in my state too.
A lot of real big companies run scams on their employees. Take Herbalife for example. Or amway. Or guitar center
What does guitar center do?
Pays their employees minimum wage
Harvests their love for music and their skill to sell overpriced low quality gear
A culture of lying and swindling basically.
A horrible little microcosm of late stage capitalism all driven by their minimum wage employees believing the lie that they are “working in the music industry”
That’s pretty much every arts industry though. The theater and film industries also have a bad habit of chewing up new workers, under the guise of “working on a passion project”. And it doesn’t matter how many people they chew through; There will always be a new graduating class full of bright-eyed and bushy-tailed graduates to abuse.
Hell, look at the video game industry. The entire industry is designed around underpaying creatives, forcing them to work unreasonable 60-80 hour weeks because of unreasonable launch dates set by marketing departments, and then abandoning the workers as soon as the game is complete. All because the creatives are passionate about what they’re creating, and capitalism has learned that it can abuse that passion. Hell, early Japanese video games even refused to put the employees in the game credits, because the publishing companies didn’t think the people who designed the games were important enough to mention.
Creative workers will tolerate a lot just so they can say they worked on a project.
Yeah the difference is
MI sales is not “the music industry”
Yet guitar center pretends it is.
I suppose that depends on how you define it, because they’re definitely tangentially related. I started my career in theater, running lights and audio for live events. Now I sell audio equipment, which I got familiar with by working in theater. I still occasionally run shows too, (when I have the time), because it’s what I enjoy doing. But the sales side of things is where the money is, so that’s where I landed in the course of my career. The vast majority of my clients are theaters, and if someone asked I’d confidently say that I work in theater.
None of that is a scam.
Just because it’s a big company doesn’t mean it isn’t a scam. Just look at how big some MLMs get.
Name and shame, please.
I will if and when I leave. Right now I need the money so I’m basically their slave.
🎶
You load sixteen tons, what do you get? Another day older and deeper in debt Saint Peter don't you call me, 'cause I can't go I owe my soul to the company store🎶
IANAL, but it is an interesting question to consider whether it would be illegal in Australia (if anything, as a test to see if the right laws are on the books to block this kind of thing). The laws are likely different in the US, and it might vary from state to state.
The Fair Work Act 2009 (Commonwealth), s325 provides that:
An employer must not directly or indirectly require an employee to spend, or pay to the employer or another person, an amount of the employee’s money or the whole or any part of an amount payable to the employee in relation to the performance of work, if:
(a) the requirement is unreasonable in the circumstances; and
(b) for a payment—the payment is directly or indirectly for the benefit of the employer or a party related to the employer.
I think you could imagine the employer arguing a few lines:
- The employee is not required to spend, it is only a factor in promotions and not retaining the same role. OP said you can “get in trouble for not using this” - countering this defence perhaps depends on proving what kind of trouble to show it is a requirement. In addition, under s340, employers are not allowed to take an adverse action against an employee for exercising or proposing to exercise a workplace right, and adverse action includes discriminating between and employee and other employees of the employer.
- That the employee is not required to pay any particular person, they can choose what to buy as long as the select from a prescribed list. However, I think that could be countered by saying this is an indirect requirement to spend, and the “or another person” attaches to the “pay” part, so I don’t think that argument would fly.
- The the requirement is reasonable - however, that could be countered by arguing the privacy angle, and the fact that this is for personal shopping, far outside the reasonable scope of an employment relationship.
- That the payment isn’t for the benefit of the employer. I think that could be countered firstly by arguing this is a requirement to spend not pay, and event if it was to pay, it is indirectly for the employer’s benefit since it allows them to attract and retain clients. The way they are pushing it could further prove this.
So I think it would probably be contrary to s325 of the Fair Work Act in Australia.
Another angle could be the right to disconnect under s333M of the Fair Work Act:
An employee may refuse to monitor, read or respond to contact, or attempted contact, from an employer outside of the employee’s working hours unless the refusal is unreasonable.
If someone has a work and a personal phone, and has the app on the work phone, but refuses to use take the work phone or install an app on their personal phone so they can respond to tracking requests from the employer, then maybe this also fits.
I also wonder if in Australia this could also be a form of cartel conduct - it is an arrangement of where purchases (other than those the company should legitimately control) are directed centrally under an arrangement by an organisation.
Under s45AD of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010,
(1) For the purposes of this Act, a provision of a contract, arrangement or understanding is a cartel provision if: (a) either of the following conditions is satisfied in relation to the provision: (i) the purpose/effect condition set out in subsection (2); (ii) the purpose condition set out in subsection (3); and (b) the competition condition set out in subsection (4) is satisfied in relation to the provision.
So the purpose condition has several alternatives separated by ‘or’, one of which is:
(3) The purpose condition is satisfied if the provision has the purpose of directly or indirectly: … (b) allocating between any or all of the parties to the contract, arrangement or understanding: (ii) the persons or classes of persons who have supplied, or who are likely to supply, goods or services to any or all of the parties to the contract, arrangement or understanding; or
It sounds like there is a solid argument the purpose condition is met - they are allocating where people who are part of the arrangement (employees) shop.
They’d also need to meet the competition condition for it to be cartel conduct. For this to be met, the arrangement might need to include the clients of the company:
(4) The competition condition is satisfied if at least 2 of the parties to the contract, arrangement or understanding: (a) are or are likely to be; or (b) but for any contract, arrangement or understanding, would be or would be likely to be; in competition with each other in relation to: … © if paragraph (2)© or (3)(b) applies in relation to a supply, or likely supply, of goods or services—the supply of those goods or services in trade or commerce; or
So it could be argued that this is a cartel arrangement between the company, its clients, and its employees, and so attract penalties for cartel conduct.
They call it “being a team player.” It basically means we will guilt you for not being unreasonably obedient.
Still, more than likely, illegal.
You know a fair way to get employees to buy what you want them to? Sell things to them at cost.
Saint Peter dont you call me, cause I can’t go I sold so my soul to the company store.
Yeah that shits probably illegal on some level but I’d call a lawyer.
It sounds like the employees are the bottom level of some kind of scam. A company that has so little faith in itself that it forces their employees to act as customers is either on the verge of ruin or just completely unethical. They’re definitely getting some kind of kick backs from this.
I’m sure they have found some kind of shitty technical loophole that makes it legal somehow, but you might still report it anonymously to the employment commission since it is 100% unethical and a serious conflict of interests.
Either way if possible find somewhere else to work as soon as you can. Once these people have bilked you out of as much of your paycheck as they can they will decide your no longer a valuable company asset
Seems like a story some newspaper would like to report on
Except they bought all the newspapers.
I am not a lawyer, and I am not your lawyer.
Off the top of my head, I can’t really see where or how this is illegal in most US jurisdictions. In “at will” states you can be hired or fired at any time for any reason* or no reason. And likewise you can quit at any time for any reason or no reason. If you can be hired or fired based on this scam, you can be promoted or held back based on it.
Having said that, this is really scammy, and I would not want to work there.
*except discrimination based on: race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age (>40), or genetics. Likewise, retaliation for unlawful sexual harassment.
It’s illegal if the company is coercing you to spend money at their “preferred” stores.
That said, so many states have business friendly laws that it’s likely a civil tort and not a criminal one.
OP, call your attorney general or department of labor (depending on the state). You may want to even call your state’s taxation board and you know for fuck sure they are doing something scammy with their taxes if they are watching you this closely.
IANAL, but I believe a business can decide not to promote an employee for any reason with the exception of protected characteristics (Gender, race, etc.)
That being said, this is unreasonably shitty, and you should look for a job with more normal management practices. If they’re pulling this, there’s likely a lot more you’re not seeing.
