One of the responsibilities of a business owner is to adequately provide for your employees. Failure to do so will result in either a lot of turnovers or some type of litigation. Either of these will result in a loss of time, money, and work production. If you do not properly address your employees' concerns they may team up and try to sue you. In this case, it will be in your best interest to contact a employer class action defense attorney. Here are a few you should do as soon as your workers start to join together against you.
Find an Attorney
As with most legal issues, there are strict timelines in which to file paperwork. If your employees have already filed anything you must reply to it quickly and accurately. It would be best to find an employment lawyer familiar with class action defense. The lawyer can get the file, read it, and decide the best course of action. They may decide to try to talk with the employees before replying to the court regarding the situation.
Check Employee Files
Some companies have employees file an arbitration agreement as part of their employment. This may be done for all employees or only specific types. Go through each employee's employment package to see if they did sign this type of agreement and what the agreement entails. The agreement may bar class action without first filing a motion to go ahead with the filing. In other words, the court will determine if there is a valid reason to file the case in the first place.
Determine How to Proceed
Your lawyer can talk with the employee plaintiffs to see if they will allow you time to make any corrections for problems noted in the case filings. If so, the employees will put a hold on the case until the time allotment has passed. If not, the lawyer may submit a motion to the court to allow for the corrections.
If the employees and the court do not allow for corrections, you will have to go through a trial to determine a settlement for the workers. An employer class action defense attorney will be needed to keep things from blowing up to a point where your business is lost. Keep in mind that more employees may join in on the suit as time goes on. However, your lawyer can put a deadline on joining. Ideally, you will be able to continue business activities until the matter is settled and your attorney will work hard to ensure you do.
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