Consumer Law, Warranties Company policy changes...

[oneluv]

I work at a small company with 6 full-time employees. Recently, I was called to jury duty and referenced my company policy manual and it stated that as a full-time employee, I was eligible for 10-days or 80 hours of jury service, less the amount the court pays. I called in on a Sunday night while at an event with my boss and was summoned the next day to jury duty, which I told him that night. Ultimately, I was chosen for the jury, which when finished could be 10 days served. I was calling in and letting our assistant know the goings-on and my office manager called me on Wed. to say that I would only be paid for 3-days/24 hours because the policy had changed. I NEVER received an updated policy manual and was never aware of this change. She claims she gave it to us, but on this last Friday, while I was out of the office at jury duty, she nonchalantly handed out an updated policy manuals with a MAY date printed on it. She gave it to the 3 employees in the office and said "look iot over, there have been some changes." She claims that it's my fault for not telling them in advance, but it doesn' say that on my manual and I did tell my boss the night before I went in. On the new manual it says that you must give notice in writing 2 weeks in advance. She told me that she willl speak with my boss and try toi get him to compansate me for the entire service, but she doubts he will. Meanwhile, they tell me I AM A VERY IMPORTANT employee, etc. What are my rights? I called a past co-worker to verify if she ever received an updated manual and she agrees with me that she never received one.

 

[oneluv]

this is in california. I am a new member...

 

[mike]

I work at a small company with 6 full-time employees. Recently, I was called to jury duty and referenced my company policy manual and it stated that as a full-time employee, I was eligible for 10-days or 80 hours of jury service, less the amount the court pays. I called in on a Sunday night while at an event with my boss and was summoned the next day to jury duty, which I told him that night. Ultimately, I was chosen for the jury, which when finished could be 10 days served. I was calling in and letting our assistant know the goings-on and my office manager called me on Wed. to say that I would only be paid for 3-days/24 hours because the policy had changed. I NEVER received an updated policy manual and was never aware of this change. She claims she gave it to us, but on this last Friday, while I was out of the office at jury duty, she nonchalantly handed out an updated policy manuals with a MAY date printed on it. She gave it to the 3 employees in the office and said "look iot over, there have been some changes." She claims that it's my fault for not telling them in advance, but it doesn' say that on my manual and I did tell my boss the night before I went in. On the new manual it says that you must give notice in writing 2 weeks in advance. She told me that she willl speak with my boss and try toi get him to compansate me for the entire service, but she doubts he will. Meanwhile, they tell me I AM A VERY IMPORTANT employee, etc. What are my rights? I called a past co-worker to verify if she ever received an updated manual and she agrees with me that she never received one.

It seems you have a couple of things to think about in addition to a little bit of a problem.

(1) You have to think about the relationship with your employer and how it might be affected. At this point there may be no dispute since the case hasn't gone more than three days. You may not want to argue this until there is a reason to.

(2) You didn't give advance notice that you would be out of work. According to the old policy, did it have that in there? I'm guessing that it did. As a result your company might not have had the time to put things in place to deal with you being out for two weeks. That was not a good idea. Giving someone notice the night before that you will be out two weeks is not reasonable. Vacation is usually the same way. In the same way you wanted reasonable notice about the change in policy, they would want reasonable notice about the jury duty.

I think this is a tough one and that if you had given them reasonable notice then you might have had a stronger case. I'm curious to know what has happened and if you had to serve more than 3 days of jury duty.