Furloughing: HR Risks & Employee Rights
As employers make the difficult decision to furlough employees during this economic downturn, we need to understand some of the human resource risks and employees rights. When employers furlough an employee, they are requiring them to take a temporary leave without pay, usually for a specific period of time.
Employees have rights during a furlough. They may also have certain restrictions and employer requirements.
Furloughed employees have the right to seek new employment. Employers risk losing talent that they’d like to retain.
Furloughed employees are eligible for unemployment benefits during this time. Some of them may have to pay back unemployment benefits. States have different rules and regulations for collecting unemployment that could disqualify them from unemployment.
Human resources should take precautions to ensure that their employees aren’t working during this time.
“Furloughed employees are absolutely banned from doing any work on behalf of their employer whatsoever. This is a zero-tolerance rule. A furloughed employee can't so much as take a phone call or answer emails. Even five minutes breaks the No Work Rule.”, as stated here.
If a salaried employee works during this leave, the employer must pay them the equivalent of their salary for the entire day. If hourly employees work, the employer must pay them for the time worked. As a precaution, its recommended that employers revoke employee access to work devices, company software programs, and even their company cell phones. Otherwise, this would be an event that triggered payment obligations.
What is the difference between furloughing employees and laying them off?
Furloughed employees remain on the company’s payroll or are given an estimate of their time off without pay.
Furloughed employees usually retain their benefits or just their health insurance.
Furloughed employees retain their employment rights.
A furlough is less complicated to implement than a layoff. Laying off employees is a process that is often time consuming and cost prohibitive.
For additional information on what was referenced here see:
This article from The Street
This previous post we did on Understanding Furloughs vs. Layoffs
If you have questions or concerns that you’d like to discuss with our team, you can consider H2 Recruits a resource. We provide HR consulting services and would like to offer our support to you during this time. So, please don’t hesitate to reach out.
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