Retaliation

[Hettel]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Ohio
I was recently fired for reporting my employer to the Health Department, for several issues, he made me serve month old pie and cobblers, was letting meat thaw out overnight in the kitchen, instead of the refrigerator, was taking down steam table to early and it was not at temp, after the steam table was taken down, still serve food out of the pans until closing, he was allowing employees to eat strips of cheese sticks that was customers, before serving. He mad us use outdate milk, by thw weeks. I called the health department on Friday Jan. 3, 2014, the department came in on Monday Jan. 6, that is when he took my keys away, then when I came in on Tuesday Jan 7th, he fired me. I was needing to know if you think I have a case...

 

[LdiJ]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Ohio
I was recently fired for reporting my employer to the Health Department, for several issues, he made me serve month old pie and cobblers, was letting meat thaw out overnight in the kitchen, instead of the refrigerator, was taking down steam table to early and it was not at temp, after the steam table was taken down, still serve food out of the pans until closing, he was allowing employees to eat strips of cheese sticks that was customers, before serving. He mad us use outdate milk, by thw weeks. I called the health department on Friday Jan. 3, 2014, the department came in on Monday Jan. 6, that is when he took my keys away, then when I came in on Tuesday Jan 7th, he fired me. I was needing to know if you think I have a case...

In my opinion that is pretty classic retaliation. However, you really need to speak to your state department of labor.

Also, keep in mind, if your employer is a restaurant, and is having trouble making it, you may not actually be able to collect anything.

 

[eerelations]

Agree. the most likely outcome is that you're reinstated. Do you really want this?

 

[Hettel]

Agree. the most likely outcome is that you're reinstated. Do you really want this?

Yes, or be compensated for loss wages, this is a restaurant and it is doing well, it is a small town, with only two food places, so it bound to do well....

 

[LeeHarveyBlotto]

Yes, or be compensated for loss wages, this is a restaurant and it is doing well, it is a small town, with only two food places, so it bound to do well....

Not when they get shut down.

 

[Zigner]

What proof do you have that you were fired because of the report? I'm not saying you weren't.

 

[LdiJ]

What proof do you have that you were fired because of the report? I'm not saying you weren't.

Timing alone would be enough for the DOL I believe. Its not the same as going to court.

 

[Zigner]

Timing alone would be enough for the DOL I believe. Its not the same as going to court.

Let's say a coworker caught the employee pocketing cash instead of putting it in to the register and reported it on Thursday night. Employer decided to investigate on Friday and found it to be true so took the keys from the employee on Monday when he reported to work, then finalized the termination on Tuesday. But, the employee (knowing he had been caught) decided to hedge his bets by filing a report with the aforementioned allegations...


I will ask again, what proof does the OP have that he was fired in retaliation for the report, as opposed to another reason?

ETA: OK, let me reprhase... Is there another possible reason the OP was fired?

 

[commentator]

Immediately, before you even begin to worry about the situation with filing a grievance with anybody about your having been fired for this, file a claim for unemployment benefits, right now. I am not at all sure you are going to be a protected whistleblower in this situation, and even if you are, it will take a very long time for this complaint to be investigated, and for a complaint to work its way through the system so that you got any back pay or reinstatement.

But since you're fired, you immediately need to file that unemployment claim, and if you are monetarily eligible, the employer must, in order to keep you from receiving unemployment, show that they had some valid, job-related misconduct reason to terminate you. The first thing they're going to do, of course, is ask you exactly what was said by the employer to you on the day that you were terminated. Then they're going to contact the employer and ask them exactly why you were terminated (according to them.)

If they say, "We terminated this employee because she told the department of health a bunch of lies about us!" that's one thing. If they say, "We caught this employee stealing from the till" or some other made up or true reason, that'll be another issue. But either way, the unemployment system will look at what evidence they have, what you say, and decide whether or not you're to receive unemployment while looking for another job. And this will be much quicker than filing any sort of grievance or trying to see if you can get your job back, which as I said, I sort of doubt it will happen. But at least unemployment is some recourse for your having been fired until you can get another job. I agree, if this business is as nasty as you say, and the health department shuts them down, you'd have been out of a job anyhow. especially if word gets out about their horrible sanitation practices. You should have been looking for something else anyway.

How did the employer know you were the one who called in on them? Did you tell them you were going to before you did it, threaten to do it if they didn't start listening to your suggestions about how to do the work? Did you brag about it or tell the other employees that you were going to do it or that you had done it?

The Health Department may come in and do a check as a result of a complaint, but they very rarely come in and say, "We had a complaint, it was called in by your employee Jane Smith and she says that you.." Usually, unless YOU told everyone you'd called in on them, they would never have known who it was or what you'd told them. Though they may have been serving their customers unsafe and dangerous food, they were not doing anything to actually put you and your co workers at risk. Reporting your employer for doing something unethical or unhealthy isn't always a protected situation.

 

[Hettel]

Immediately, before you even begin to worry about the situation with filing a grievance with anybody about your having been fired for this, file a claim for unemployment benefits, right now. I am not at all sure you are going to be a protected whistleblower in this situation, and even if you are, it will take a very long time for this complaint to be investigated, and for a complaint to work its way through the system so that you got any back pay or reinstatement.

But since you're fired, you immediately need to file that unemployment claim, and if you are monetarily eligible, the employer must, in order to keep you from receiving unemployment, show that they had some valid, job-related misconduct reason to terminate you. The first thing they're going to do, of course, is ask you exactly what was said by the employer to you on the day that you were terminated. Then they're going to contact the employer and ask them exactly why you were terminated (according to them.)

If they say, "We terminated this employee because she told the department of health a bunch of lies about us!" that's one thing. If they say, "We caught this employee stealing from the till" or some other made up or true reason, that'll be another issue. But either way, the unemployment system will look at what evidence they have, what you say, and decide whether or not you're to receive unemployment while looking for another job. And this will be much quicker than filing any sort of grievance or trying to see if you can get your job back, which as I said, I sort of doubt it will happen. But at least unemployment is some recourse for your having been fired until you can get another job. I agree, if this business is as nasty as you say, and the health department shuts them down, you'd have been out of a job anyhow. especially if word gets out about their horrible sanitation practices. You should have been looking for something else anyway.

How did the employer know you were the one who called in on them? Did you tell them you were going to before you did it, threaten to do it if they didn't start listening to your suggestions about how to do the work? Did you brag about it or tell the other employees that you were going to do it or that you had done it?

The Health Department may come in and do a check as a result of a complaint, but they very rarely come in and say, "We had a complaint, it was called in by your employee Jane Smith and she says that you.." Usually, unless YOU told everyone you'd called in on them, they would never have known who it was or what you'd told them. Though they may have been serving their customers unsafe and dangerous food, they were not doing anything to actually put you and your co workers at risk. Reporting your employer for doing something unethical or unhealthy isn't always a protected situation.

Thank you for responding, this is all new to me and I just wanted to know what to do.....the reason he knew it was me, was because I had questioned him with everything that I had called into the health department, he told me I was wrong with everything. I have my servsafe certificate and Food Safety licence and I knew everything that he was making us to was wrong. I mean it is only obvious that I called in on Friday, then he took my keys away on Monday, then he waited till I walked in on Tuesday to tell me that he didn't want me working there anymore, so therefore I was fired? Correct?

 

[Zigner]

Thank you for responding, this is all new to me and I just wanted to know what to do.....the reason he knew it was me, was because I had questioned him with everything that I had called into the health department, he told me I was wrong with everything. I have my servsafe certificate and Food Safety licence and I knew everything that he was making us to was wrong. I mean it is only obvious that I called in on Friday, then he took my keys away on Monday, then he waited till I walked in on Tuesday to tell me that he didn't want me working there anymore, so therefore I was fired? Correct?

If you called on Friday, then there is virtually no way the employer would know about you reporting anything. Government just doesn't move that fast.

 

[LdiJ]

If you called on Friday, then there is virtually no way the employer would know about you reporting anything. Government just doesn't move that fast.

The health department in my city does. I would imagine that most health departments do because they deal not only with routine matters but emergent ones as well. With the kinds of things the OP described, that would be treated as emergent because many people could get sick if they delayed any amount of time.

 

[Zigner]

The health department in my city does. I would imagine that most health departments do because they deal not only with routine matters but emergent ones as well. With the kinds of things the OP described, that would be treated as emergent because many people could get sick if they delayed any amount of time.

Fair Enough.

 

[stealth2]

So wait... NO customers realized they were using outdated milk? Or eating cold food? Were they all stupid?

 

[commentator]

Yes, I'd say you're fired. So have you filed your unemployment claim yet? As I said, that's the first thing you need to do. It will be interesting to see what the employer gives as the reason they terminated you when the inquiry is made.

I'm also curious about when the health inspectors actually contacted the business, whether they did an emergency on site inspection ( I strongly suspect they don't work on weekends!) on Monday, or what happened that caused them to know by Monday that you'd complained against them. They very rarely call a business and do anything by phone, as this will probably result in immediate correction of the offending behaviors before they actually get on site. So did you see anyone there investigating?

But if I'm understanding this, you confronted your employer about the unclean and unsafe practices, and told him you had your Serv-safe certificate and food handlers card and all these other things, and that what was going on was wrong wrong wrong, and that if he didn't change the way things were being done, you were going to call somebody, right? How long have you been working for this employer?