The latest version of Assembly Bill 5, which codifies the California Supreme Court’s Dynamex decision that was issued in April 2018, is about to become law.  Dramatically changing decades of settled law in California, Dynamex created a so-called ABC test requiring companies to satisfy each of three strict criteria in…

The National Labor Relations Board earlier today held that a courier services company misclassified drivers as independent contractors instead of employees protected under the National Labor Relations Act.  The Board also held that the company violated the NLRA when it terminated its relationship with one of the couriers because of…

We are often asked, what industries are impacted by independent contractor misclassification?  While IC misclassification claims are most prevalent in the construction, transportation, and gig economy businesses, there are few, if any, industries that are immune from IC misclassification allegations.  This past month alone we report on class and collective…

Earlier today, July 9, the New Jersey Misclassification Task Force issued its first Report. The Task Force, created by an Executive Order issued by Governor Phil Murphy on May 3, 2018, includes representatives from the New Jersey Labor, Treasury, and Law Departments as well as five other state agencies. The…

This past month was relatively uneventful in the area of independent contractor misclassification and compliance news, if one regards a $16.5 million settlement as unremarkable. But the amount of the settlements in IC misclassification cases appears to be increasing substantially.  This $16.5 million settlement involves a very large logistics company…

The publisher of this legal blog and Matthew Kane, the General Counsel and Chief Compliance Officer of Z Capital Group, LLC, wrote an article as guest authors for Private Equity Law Report entitled “How to Evaluate Portfolio Companies for Independent Contractor Misclassification Liability.”  The article, published on June 18, 2019,…

The past two months were two of the busiest ever in terms of judicial decisions involving claims of independent contractor misclassification, administrative and regulatory initiatives, and legislative developments.  They are combined in this blog post.

Two of the most impactful cases involved Amazon and Jan-Pro, a nationwide commercial cleaning franchisor.…

Following on the heels of a very favorable decision by a federal appellate court earlier this year that insurance agents for American Family Insurance were not misclassified by the company as independent contractors in a class action brought under ERISA, a federal district court in New Jersey earlier this week…

Ride-sharing giant Uber Technologies announced by way of a filing today with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that it has reached agreements to resolve the independent contractor (IC) classification claims of a large majority of the 60,000 drivers in the U.S. who have filed arbitration demands or indicated an…

Earlier today, the U.S. Department of Labor issued an Opinion Letter on the issue of independent contractor status of an on-demand virtual marketplace company (VMC) that refers end-market consumers to service providers who offer delivery, transportation, shopping, moving, cleaning, plumbing, painting, and household services. The Labor Department examined six factors…