Yes, daughter should contact the labor board. It looks like the employer is just looking for an excuse not to pay her. She did the work, and earned the pay. She did not agree to take the position as a volunteer. If she’s worried about being embarrassed, tell her the employer has more to lose than her. They are the ones that hired her and let her work with the kids alone without completing the background check. THEY are the ones putting the kids at risk. What if one of the prospective coaches was a child sex offender, and they failed to run that check?
I doubt the employer is looking for the excuse to not pay her. Instead someone did not do their job timely and now has a problem as they should have not hired her. This person is trying to make the problem go away by not cutting the check.
I agree she should push it as she did the work.
Completely agree about the daughter contacting the labor board in her state. This is a labor issue. She worked, and MUST be compensated. No excuses.
She doesn’t want to “make waves”? The folks not paying her have a LOT more at risk than she does. She did a job. She needs to be paid for doing it.
And regarding the person who didn’t do their job getting a background check done…not cutting a check to this girl for work done does NOT make this person more responsible. If this a a company issue, that person should be terminated.
You have to wonder how many others are not or have not been paid.
yearstogo- That is not correct. If that offense was truly 8 years ago, the justification for not hiring her is very weak. I’m an employment lawyer and I deal with this every day. 8 years for that type of offense is too long ago. They really shouldn’t even be checking back that far.
I don’t actually believe the employer is trying to avoid paying her. It is a municipal entity in a high visibility area and they just blew following their own protocol. My husband tends to subrogate himself in interactions (ie when he makes a business call and the receiver picks up, he first asks if it is s good time for them to take his call. If they answered the phone, you already have their answer). I suffer from assertiveness and always wanting things to be fair and just. His affliction is a need to be the most accommodating person in the room.I think our kids see our two approaches and adopt his because it is the easier approach. If someone is screwing you, who cares if they like you?!
How can that possibly be legal?!?!?!
What if they failed to do a background check, someone had a more recent:relevant issue, and children were harmed? They’d be paying a lot more than a season of coach’s pay.
I think she should raise a stink for that reason—to call attention to their complete failure.
@Nrdsb4 It is not legal. Use of background checks is a really big issue right now in employment law, because it can have the effect of really weeding out minority applicants. Employers have to be very, very careful. In most cases the checks (which are almost always done by an independent company and not the employer itself) only go back 7 years at the most. However, if a really horrific offense comes to light beyond the 7 years which can be relevant to the particular job (i.e. a child molestation offense from 12 years ago and the person is working retail and engaging with the public or younger employees) the employer is well within its rights to terminate the employee. A DUI from 8 years ago- especially if the employee isn’t driving as part of the job- no way.
When they hired the D, when they let her begin work, continue to work, and complete the assignment…that’s why they owe her. They can’t come back and say, well we had rules we didn’t follow. And rather than eat our mistake, deal with it like the grown ups we are, at this organization, we’ll just penalize you.
The D doesn’t want to make waves. See how that’s what the son is also saying? “I’ll take my licks rather than handle this.”
I really feel for OP and have often been the more assertive parent. But their attitude isn’t a great life skill and I’d worry that’s what will haunt (not just in work, but in interpersonal.) More than a drug arrest for a small amount, which many employers won’t be concerned with.
They are trying to avoid paying her to save money. It is a major liability for the city for employees not to be background checked before working with youth. Unless it states in her contract that she will be paid unless something is found in her background check, then they are in breach of contract. Since they claim that the background check wasn’t completed until after she started working with youth, I’m sure the parents would just love to know that. She did the work so she is entitled to her pay.
OP-I know of a case where the diversion program was able to be completed in the home state without the need for travel. Court appearance was also handled by the attorney.
@yearstogo – the point is that the person with the marijuana charge in Waco seems to be a self-supporting adult who does not currently live with the OP. She can consult with a lawyer so that she can better understand the process herself, but she has no power to force her son to talk with a lawyer that she hires, and a lawyer cannot represent the son without the son’s cooperation and consent.
The OP may or may not have the power to change the dynamic of her relationship with her son, so that the son listens to her advice … but at present she doesn’t have any ability to make her son talk to or accept any particular lawyer. So, " I would get the attorney and have the attorney speak with the son about what might happen in the future" — only works if the son will accept a call.
There comes a time when parents no longer can manage the lives of their adult offspring. It hurts like hell to sit and watch young adults make mistakes and then compound them with poor decisions, but from post #41 the present relationship is one of avoidance: (“he does not want to face what happened so avoids me as the enforcer in the family. I keep trying to get him to sit down with me and to go through files and correspondence about it but he won’t.”)
I’d note that the OP may not have the whole story - she only has the information the son has chosen to share with her. The same is true with the daughter & the daughter’s employment situation – I agree that if the daughter was hired and worked the daughter would be owed money, but it seems odd that the daughter wouldn’t have been paid for her work along the way — so perhaps there are some important pieces of information missing from that account as well.
Agreed, calmom.
@GloriaVaughn She thinks her supervisor is allowed to let anyone know he dropped the ball.
@my-3-sons That is great to see. I will explore that with him and his lawyer.
@calmom @yearstogo His legal address is still our home, his mail comes here, we pay his car and health insurances and expenses, his stuff is here. He is working a job in outdoor education and they have staff housing available for in between courses. He could in no way be self supporting at this point, even though he is happy to sleep in a tent anywhere. He is transitioning to adulthood but while the law recognizes that he magically became an adult on his 18th birthday, he is not self supporting.
Regardless, we WANT him launched and on his own. We support his efforts to get there, regardless of the job. IT is always possible that there is more to a story than we know but we have already had the big tears confession session and it would be hard to imagine he was holding anything back.
The daughter was legitimately hired, led a fledgling program to its first tournament success, and I was at her side through all her court proceedings relating to that DUI long ago. She has a lot of anxiety and I believe her that she is embarrassed and doesn’t want to create a problem. Being assertive doesn’t come easily to everyone and with my husband’s predisposition to always yield (probably why the marriage works, huh?), they find that a safer approach than mom’s desire to see situations be “fair” even if that involves confronting unpleasant situations head on.
Thanks for weighing in. I do appreciate the input and being challenged. I am waiting to hear back from a couple of leads but with it being the weekend, am not surprised I have not. I do hope @curmudgeon finds his way out of his sabbatical for a moment. Son is working today but says will be home tomorrow. Wish he would not have chosen to push to the end but I will still try to help him see his bigger picture.
@GloriaVaughn Sorry for the type o above. She thinks her supervisor is AFRAID to let anyone know he messed up. Homeland Security is part of the background check team.
If I were facing the possibility of one of my children having big barriers to being self-supporting (losing a job, not being able to get other jobs, losing financial aid, having to pay back financial aid, etc.), I would be very strongly encouraging hiring a good lawyer.
If the daughter was hired as a contractor, payment at the end is not that unusual. Our HS marching band has several assistants that work with the students during the competition season. Only one is an employee of the school district (part time). The others are hired by out affiliate Music Parent Association, The employee is paid on the same schedule as other employees. The others are paid at the end of the season in one lump sum, and are issued 1099s.
Depending on the requirements of the job, even the difference between being an employee and a contractor might be worthy of consideration by the labor board. In many states there are legal definitions to differentiate between contractors and employees - if the employer controls the scope, location, and hours of work, you’re talking about an employee - this would be important in terms of who is paying the employment taxes. Of course, if she’s not being paid at all, then nobody is paying them.
@grandscheme " He is working a job in outdoor education " Well he can kiss working in education goodbye unless he is willing to work with a good lawyer and try to get the charges dropped. He would also run into issues with any job that required him to be bonded.
I was working in a office where we interacted with kids on a daily basis. The CEO decided to have us all bonded since several of us handled money. Only 2 of us out of 30 were able to be bonded. I was shocked that only 2 of us passed the check for bonding.