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Asklemmy @lemmy.ml
muusemuuse @lemm.ee

What laws, is any, does this break?

American here. I have a job where they have a perk where you submit receipts through their app or website and you earn points you can cash out at some point if you shop with clients of our company. Sounds like a nice little promotional incentive, right?

Well, they say it’s optional but it’s not. You can apparently get in trouble for not using this and we’ve been pulled aside about it and warned we must use this stupid thing.

The idea is the app you install must be given permission to see your location at all times. It then checks the area to ensure you are favoring clients of our company as opposed to our competitors when you shop. When you shop at one of our clients, you must report your receipt to the company showing everything you bought while there. Even if you are buying gas, you need to report it.

I don’t participate in this invasion of privacy. I actually want to put less of my data out there in general, not more. I don’t even have a grocery store discount card. We were told in a meeting this week that promotions in this company are influenced by how much/if you participate in the program. We were told people have been denied promotions because they did not participate in this program.

If I’m off the clock they don’t get to decide what I do. They can fuck themselves. And I am surely not giving them a little report of what I buy. But saying we are ineligible for career advancement within the company unless we buy groceries, gas, etc from preferred vendors seems sketchy. Is this legal?

54 comments

  • When asking about laws, it is essential to say where you live. Different places have different laws. After a look through your recent posts, it appears you live in Ohio. These practices probably violate specific laws in Ohio.

    One of them is ORC 2903.216 (B) (1), which prohibits causing a tracking device or application to monitor a person's movement without their consent.

    The other is ORC 1345.02 (A), which prohibits unfair or deceptive trade practices. It's a bit more open to interpretation, but something makes me think a judge would not be amused.

    Anyway, I'm not a lawyer, and it sounds like you need one. It's not rare that lawyers offer free consultations to determine if you have a real case.

    • Well I don't know what a lawyer would actually do for me here. I haven't suffered any damages yet. Doesn't it have to directly impact me first, then I would have a case? The whole thing is about things NOT happening to me, eg NOT getting promoted.

      • A lawyer could point you in the right direction. Not all legal action is necessarily "damages" (also, the lack of a promotion is damages—if your boss says to you "You're my most skilled employee, but I don't want to give you a promotion because you're a woman", that's unlawful discrimination in any place that prohibits sexism. Of course in the vast majority of cases it is much harder to prove since the boss won't actually explicitly say that, but you get the principle of the law); legal action can be to correct a wrong, in this case changing company policy to ensure that employees are not discriminated against on the basis of not using this app. You can just explain the situation over email to a law firm that deals with labour law, and if perhaps you'd be better served by a different law firm for instance, they will be able to point you in that direction.

      • A consultation with a lawyer will tell you what, if anything a lawyer will do for you. Pressure consisting of implied loss of opportunity is probably enough.

        Alternately, you might not have a case, and a consultation will tell you that too.

  • Saint Peter dont you call me, cause I can't go I sold so my soul to the company store.

    Yeah that shits probably illegal on some level but I'd call a lawyer.

  • 🎶

     txt
        
You load sixteen tons, what do you get?
Another day older and deeper in debt
Saint Peter don't you call me, 'cause I can't go
I owe my soul to the company store

    🎶

  • It sounds like the employees are the bottom level of some kind of scam. A company that has so little faith in itself that it forces their employees to act as customers is either on the verge of ruin or just completely unethical. They're definitely getting some kind of kick backs from this.

    I'm sure they have found some kind of shitty technical loophole that makes it legal somehow, but you might still report it anonymously to the employment commission since it is 100% unethical and a serious conflict of interests.

    Either way if possible find somewhere else to work as soon as you can. Once these people have bilked you out of as much of your paycheck as they can they will decide your no longer a valuable company asset

  • IANAL, but I believe a business can decide not to promote an employee for any reason with the exception of protected characteristics (Gender, race, etc.)

    That being said, this is unreasonably shitty, and you should look for a job with more normal management practices. If they're pulling this, there's likely a lot more you're not seeing.

  • IANAL, but it is an interesting question to consider whether it would be illegal in Australia (if anything, as a test to see if the right laws are on the books to block this kind of thing). The laws are likely different in the US, and it might vary from state to state.

    The Fair Work Act 2009 (Commonwealth), s325 provides that:

    An employer must not directly or indirectly require an employee to spend, or pay to the employer or another person, an amount of the employee’s money or the whole or any part of an amount payable to the employee in relation to the performance of work, if:

    (a) the requirement is unreasonable in the circumstances; and

    (b) for a payment—the payment is directly or indirectly for the benefit of the employer or a party related to the employer.

    I think you could imagine the employer arguing a few lines:

    • The employee is not required to spend, it is only a factor in promotions and not retaining the same role. OP said you can "get in trouble for not using this" - countering this defence perhaps depends on proving what kind of trouble to show it is a requirement. In addition, under s340, employers are not allowed to take an adverse action against an employee for exercising or proposing to exercise a workplace right, and adverse action includes discriminating between and employee and other employees of the employer.
    • That the employee is not required to pay any particular person, they can choose what to buy as long as the select from a prescribed list. However, I think that could be countered by saying this is an indirect requirement to spend, and the "or another person" attaches to the "pay" part, so I don't think that argument would fly.
    • The the requirement is reasonable - however, that could be countered by arguing the privacy angle, and the fact that this is for personal shopping, far outside the reasonable scope of an employment relationship.
    • That the payment isn't for the benefit of the employer. I think that could be countered firstly by arguing this is a requirement to spend not pay, and event if it was to pay, it is indirectly for the employer's benefit since it allows them to attract and retain clients. The way they are pushing it could further prove this.

    So I think it would probably be contrary to s325 of the Fair Work Act in Australia.

    Another angle could be the right to disconnect under s333M of the Fair Work Act:

    An employee may refuse to monitor, read or respond to contact, or attempted contact, from an employer outside of the employee’s working hours unless the refusal is unreasonable.

    If someone has a work and a personal phone, and has the app on the work phone, but refuses to use take the work phone or install an app on their personal phone so they can respond to tracking requests from the employer, then maybe this also fits.

    I also wonder if in Australia this could also be a form of cartel conduct - it is an arrangement of where purchases (other than those the company should legitimately control) are directed centrally under an arrangement by an organisation.

    Under s45AD of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010,

    (1) For the purposes of this Act, a provision of a contract, arrangement or understanding is a cartel provision if: (a) either of the following conditions is satisfied in relation to the provision: (i) the purpose/effect condition set out in subsection (2); (ii) the purpose condition set out in subsection (3); and (b) the competition condition set out in subsection (4) is satisfied in relation to the provision.

    So the purpose condition has several alternatives separated by 'or', one of which is:

    (3) The purpose condition is satisfied if the provision has the purpose of directly or indirectly: ... (b) allocating between any or all of the parties to the contract, arrangement or understanding: (ii) the persons or classes of persons who have supplied, or who are likely to supply, goods or services to any or all of the parties to the contract, arrangement or understanding; or

    It sounds like there is a solid argument the purpose condition is met - they are allocating where people who are part of the arrangement (employees) shop.

    They'd also need to meet the competition condition for it to be cartel conduct. For this to be met, the arrangement might need to include the clients of the company:

    (4) The competition condition is satisfied if at least 2 of the parties to the contract, arrangement or understanding: (a) are or are likely to be; or (b) but for any contract, arrangement or understanding, would be or would be likely to be; in competition with each other in relation to: ... (c) if paragraph (2)(c) or (3)(b) applies in relation to a supply, or likely supply, of goods or services—the supply of those goods or services in trade or commerce; or

    So it could be argued that this is a cartel arrangement between the company, its clients, and its employees, and so attract penalties for cartel conduct.

54 comments