Author: Richard Reibstein Esq.

Last Friday, October 14, a group of 17 “agency operators” for jointly-owned Avis Rent a Car and Budget Rent a Car filed a class action class action complaint in California alleging that the rental car agencies misclassified them...

Following on the heels of aggressive new measures announced by the U.S. Department of Labor and IRS in the past month and the recent enactment of a new California law to crack down on willful misclassification of employees as...

California joins a growing list of states that have enacted independent contractor misclassification legislation in the past four years.  This new law, signed by Governor Jerry Brown on October 9, 2011, adds harsh financial...

The U.S. Department of Labor recently scored a meaningful victory in yet another court case where a company failed to structure, document, and execute properly an independent contractor relationship with workers who were paid on...

On September 19, 2011, Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis and IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman signed a Memorandum of Understanding to coordinate both agencies’ law enforcement efforts aimed at businesses that misclassify employees as...

The IRS yesterday announced a new program to permit taxpayers to voluntarily reclassify independent contractors as employees for federal employment tax purposes. The program, called the “Voluntary Classification Settlement...

After much fanfare on the topic of Form 1099 reporting, Congress voted and on April 14 the president signed into law a bill repealing the expansion of the Form 1099 reporting requirements.  Originally passed as part of the...

On Friday, April 8, 2011, Senators Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) introduced the Payroll Fraud Prevention Act (S. 770), a trimmed-down version of the Employee Misclassification...

The Utah House approved on February 10, 2011 a bill (S.B. 35) targeting construction companies that classify individuals as owners in order to avoid paying for workers’ compensation insurance and unemployment insurance or...

The Pennsylvania Construction Workplace Misclassification Act was signed into law on October 13, 2010.  Also called House Bill 400 and Act 72 of 2010, the new law went into effect on February 10, 2011. Earlier this month, the...