Employer misconduct

[katrina]

I work for a national brokerage firm. I hurt my back and have been out since end of January this yr. My employer has been kept up to date with my progress via notes from doctors, etc. They informed me that everything is ok and my job will be there when I return, which I have all intentions of doing. My concern is an incident that happened yesterday. I also hold another job which my employer is well aware of and they have given me written consent to have. Without my knowledge, my manager called my other employer and asked if they were sending me excessive pages on my voicemail pager (which I have turned off) because they felt it was inhibiting my job performance. My 2nd job told them no, they were not and 1st job said "Thank you" and hung up. My second employer called me to let me know of the conversation. I am very upset. How dare my 1st job share job related info with my 2nd employer? I have copy of my last review with 1st employer and it is all 10's (the highest you can get). I also have rec'd awards from this empoyer for great work. I cannot believe they can go behind my back and call my other employer and harass me in this way. I never conduct business of my 2nd employer at my 1st job and vise versa. Why then do they feel the need to embarass me in this way? I called my 1st job manager and he apologized profusely saying that someone told him this info and he had to follow up. I have been out of the office since end of Jan and now they get this info? What recourse if any do I have? I feel that I am being harassed and am very angry at this entire situation. I now have a bad taste in my mouth for this firm. Is this ethical? I have not worked for employer 1 or 2 since I got hurt and I feel that my ist job had no right to cross the line. Thanks for the oportunity to share my experience. I just want them to feel my pain and embarassement.

 

[Attorney_Replogle]

If I understand your situation correctly, the 1st employer asked one question and shared their concern that excessive pages to your VM was inhibiting your performance at job 1. Generally speaking employers have a limited right to share job information with third parties that have a reasonable right to know. I don't think that your situation would fall into this limited immunity scenario. Assuming I am right, the question is how have you been hurt by this. You go on to speak of your anger, as well as your feelings of being harassed and upset. Legally the question boils down to what are those feelings worth given the situation? If that is all that happened to you, then you are probably looking at nominal damages ($1.00) or something just a little more. Unless your state has other laws (I am in CA and am speaking from that perspective) that would allow a fine of a certain sum, you have at best a technical violation by the first employer. So it is not worth pursuing a claim for.

However, if your injury you mention happened at work and you have a Worker's Compensation claim, then the first employer's action may amount to something more. Does this answer your question?

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Mark B. Replogle