Frequently Asked Questions About Employment Litigation

We handle most employment matters. Specific types of cases we have experience handling include discrimination cases, including disability, sexual harassment, age, gender, pregnancy, and sexual orientation cases. We also have litigated cases involving contract disputes, partnership disputes (including shareholders' derivative actions), overtime cases, and disability cases.

You should consult a lawyer whenever you are being asked to sign a document or if you feel you are being repeatedly harassed at work or retaliated against for making a claim or being a whistleblower. You should also contact an attorney if you believe your employer is taking actions that negatively affect your rights and its actions are motivated by unlawful means. Not every employment dispute requires a lawyer, and often the first step is to speak to your union representative if you are a member of a union, but an employment lawyer may be able to assist you in dealing with a serious dispute in the workplace if you believe you have been treated unfairly. A lawyer can counsel you on how to handle the situation and on whether you have any legal claims.

We encourage you to visit [www.workplacefairness.org] if you have any questions about what the law considers impermissible actions in the workplace.

If you call our offices, we will make our best efforts to get back to you within 2 business days to help determine whether we may be able to assist you legally. If your issue is one that we normally handle, a lawyer will call you to discuss your problem and to help you determine whether we can help you. In the meantime, you can visit the resources listed on our resources page, including the Equal Employment Opportunities Commission's website, the New York State Department of Labor's website, or the National Law Employment website to get a better understanding of your legal rights.

Discrimination generally occurs when an employee is intentionally treated differently because of the employee's race, color, religion, national origin, disability, gender, sexual orientation, or age because of the employer's system, such as its hiring process, has a negative effect on people in the protected categories or classes. To prove unlawful discrimination, employees must be able to show that an action affecting employment was based on the fact that the employee belongs to a protected class. If the action is intentionally discriminatory, it is called disparate treatment. If the operation of the employer's system had an unintentional discriminatory effect, it is said to have a disparate impact.