Coffee and Compliance Webinar: Navigating Minor Employment Laws and Best Practices

The inaugural Coffee and Compliance Webinar, hosted by Samantha Gallagher, director of product compliance at Harri, brought together industry experts Glenn Grindlinger and Carolyn Richmond to discuss crucial aspects of minor employment laws and compliance. This informative session provided attendees with a comprehensive understanding of the legal requirements and best practices for employing minors in various industries.

The webinar began with Grindlinger, regional practice lead for Fox Rothschild's Labor and Employment Department in New York City, providing a detailed overview of minor employment laws across the country. Grindlinger covered both federal and state regulations, highlighting the significant legal implications and potential penalties for non-compliance.

Richmond, chair of Fox Rothschild’s Hospitality Practice and former co-chair of the firm's Labor and Employment Department, delved into the practical aspects of hiring and onboarding minor employees. She discussed the importance of proper training, anti-discrimination policies, and the nuances of managing young workers, including handling harassment issues and dealing with parents.

The session also covered the intricacies of unpaid internships, with Richmond outlining the federal guidelines that determine when an internship can be unpaid. Additionally, Gallagher provided insights into how Harri's TeamLive platform can help employers stay compliant with minor labor laws by automating and enforcing scheduling rules.

During a Q&A session, Grindlinger and Richmond addressed specific questions from attendees, providing further clarity on minor employment issues. The transcript below captures the full discussion and key points covered during this insightful and educational event. It has been edited for clarity, style and brevity.

Samantha Gallagher: Hello, friends. Thank you so much for joining us today for the inaugural Coffee and Compliance Webinar. My name is Samantha Gallagher, and I am the director of product compliance at Harri. In my role, I focus on the development and implementation of compliance functionality corresponding to regulatory and legal requirements in the wage and hour space.

Today, I am thrilled to have Glenn Grindlinger and Carolyn Richmond with me. Glenn is the regional practice lead for Fox Rothschild's Labor and Employment Department in New York City. He represents management in the full spectrum of labor and employment law matters, including defending clients in single plaintiff cases and class actions involving claims of Fair Labor Standards Act and state wage and hour law violations. Glenn also counsels clients on day-to-day employment, wage and hour, labor relations, and contractual matters, as well as employment law issues that arise in connection with mergers and acquisitions.

Carolyn is the chair of Fox Rothschild’s Hospitality Practice and former co-chair for the firm's Labor and Employment Department. Her practice largely consists of representing and counseling employers in the hospitality industry, specifically restaurants, hotels, nightlife and event venues. Carolyn has extensive experience litigating wage and hour class actions and employment discrimination cases and regularly counsels clients on a variety of workplace issues and crisis management.

We are super excited to welcome you all here today, and we hope this will be the first of many Coffee and Compliance webinars. The topic of today's webinar is minor employment. Glenn will kick things off with a high-level overview of minor employment laws across the country. Then, Carolyn will speak to hiring and onboarding minor employees in your business. We will wrap up with an overview of how Harri can assist with minor employment today and discuss some of the features related to minor employment we’re planning to build at Harri. Finally, we will close out with a Q&A session. Please note that you can submit questions throughout the presentation using the Q&A functionality within this webinar platform. We will do our best to answer as many questions as possible throughout the presentation.

With that being said, I will now hand it over to Glenn, who will walk us through minor employment laws across the country.

Glenn Grindlinger: Thank you, Samantha. Good morning to those of you on the West Coast, and good afternoon to everyone else. We’re going to talk about wage and hour issues concerning minor employment. To ensure everyone is on the same page, when I talk about minor employment, I refer to employees under the age of 18. Although the law often refers to this as child labor, it includes employees who are 16 or 17 years old. The U.S. Department of Labor and analogous state agencies take the issue of child labor very seriously, and even minor infractions can result in significant fines, penalties, and liability.

We look at two main areas with child labor: federal law and state law, and sometimes municipal law. Under federal law, the Fair Labor Standards Act categorizes minor employment into hours of work and the type of work that can be done. This is further divided into two age groups: 14- and 15-year-olds, and 16- and 17-year-olds. Generally, if they are under 14, they cannot work unless they are your child, working on a farm, or in entertainment.

For 14- and 15-year-olds, they cannot work during school hours, and school hours are determined by the local public school where the child resides. They cannot work before 7 a.m. or after 7 p.m. from Labor Day until May 31, and they can work until 9 p.m. from June 1 to Labor Day. On school days, they cannot work more than three hours, and on non-school days, they cannot work more than eight hours. During a school week, they cannot work more than 18 hours and they cannot work overtime.

For 16- and 17-year-olds, there is no federal cap on hours worked or when they can work, but state laws may impose restrictions. For instance, New York has significant restrictions on 16-year-olds working when school is in session. They cannot work past 10 p.m. and cannot work more than 44 hours during a week. In contrast, states like Texas follow federal law for hours worked for 16- and 17-year-olds.

Regarding the type of work, 16- and 17-year-olds cannot engage in motor vehicle driving, use power-driven meat slicers, or use balers or compactors. Similarly, 14- and 15-year-olds have restrictions such as not working on ladders, engaging in baking or cooking over open flames, or working in walk-in freezers.

Violating child labor laws can result in fines up to $15,138 per violation under the Fair Labor Standards Act. Even minor infractions can add up quickly, resulting in significant fines and penalties. State Departments of Labor also enforce these laws stringently, with fines and penalties often higher than other types of violations.

Carolyn Richmond: It's kind of hard to talk about summer hires and minors without using the term “intern.” So I know, going back even to when I was a college student, having an internship was something incredible to get. I never expected pay. Forty years later, that is possibly still an issue, and I still get calls from offices and financial services and retail about whether we can have a college or high school kid that really wants to intern. My gut reaction, our first reaction, is usually “Sure, but you better be paying them at least the minimum wage.” There is a seven-factor test under federal law with respect to when an internship can be considered non-paid — I'll go over those factors very quickly — and different factors may have more weight in certain circumstances. So it's not a question of needing all seven. There is some variety in interpretation, but here's generally what you want to look for. 

The intern and the employer must understand that there is no expectation of compensation. That's an easy one, but likely that alone won't pass muster.

The internship has to provide training similar to what they would get in an educational environment. This is tough, especially in food services. If all they're doing is working as a line cook or a host, it's not educational compared to culinary school. When I was HR and legal counsel at a restaurant group, we developed a summer internship program to meet these factors, including weekly meetings on academic topics.

The internship must be tied to the intern’s formal education program. Internships during the year sponsored by schools that put their students into work are a big factor for unpaid status. Just hiring your friend’s cousin’s son for the summer probably won't cut it.

The program must accommodate the intern’s academic commitments and correspond to the academic calendar. This factor considers the timing of the internship in relation to school schedules.

The duration of the internship is limited to the period during which the intern is receiving beneficial learning. An unpaid internship cannot go on indefinitely.

The intern’s work complements, rather than displaces, the work of paid employees. If you hire interns to cover roles that you would otherwise pay someone to do, it won’t pass muster.

There is no expectation of a paid job at the end of the internship. It should not be a tryout for a permanent position.

If you follow these guidelines, you should be in good shape. Make sure you are reviewing the FLSA regulations and your state laws. Many states have good information on their websites detailing jurisdictional requirements. Focus on sexual harassment and anti-discrimination training, and ensure managers are attentive to these newer employees. If you have unpaid internships, consult with counsel.

Gallagher: Being mindful of time, I’ll speak briefly on how Harri will help you employ minors this summer. Once you've hired a minor, you'll build their profile within TeamLive. By entering their birth date, TeamLive will know they are a minor and require you to select a minor type and school calendar. We recommend building out these minor rules and school calendars in advance.

When scheduling minors, the system will display their school hours and alert you if you try to schedule them during those hours or beyond their allowable hours. This functionality ensures compliance with minor labor laws, preventing the publication of schedules with violations.

We are also developing features to track minor work permits and expiration dates, and we will soon release Live Schedule, which shows real-time data on compliance.

Please reach out to your account manager for more information on these functionalities.

Watch the original webinar by registering here.

To find out more information on Harri, please visit https://1851franchise.com/harri.