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Question about commisions not being paid and hostile work environment

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Eagle1

Junior Member
What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? California

I was terminated from my job yesterday. My position was inside sales. I was at this compnay for 18 months. During my employment I experienced several unprofessional and possibly illegal acts towards myself and other employees. Would I have any legal recourse based on the following situations that occured?

- When I was terminated, I was told that I will receive my hourly within 3 days, but not my commission (no customers on terms. EVERYONE PAYS UPFRONT PRIOR TO SHIPPING) Am I supposed to recieve all monies earned within 3 days?

- What is California's legal stance or defintion of commissions? What are the DOL guidelines on commission?

- A memo was passed out 1 hour after I was terminated saying that I stole company property, while my termination papers say nothing of this. All employees were required to sign this memo and return it to management. During my last meeting with my superiors I was never told of this either. Can a company legally slander you like this?

- The company entered into my PERSONAL email address and another co-workers PERSONAL email address via hidden software on our work computers that we were never made aware of. They read an e-mail in there about my workplace and fired me for for it. Can a company legally enter an employees PERSONAL email w/o permission?

-I was physically threatened by my manger to "step outside" when a debate turned hostile. I told the CEO and was told "don't worry about it, you are over reacting". My manger stayed in his position with no repercussions.

-My self and several employees were verbally threatened on many occasions if the company was doing poorly.

Do I have any recourse on any of these points? Any and all advice, big or small, is greatly appreciated. Btw, if this is in the wrong forum, I apologize and please move accordingly.

Thanks in advance to all that respond.
 


cbg

I'm a Northern Girl
I'm going to leave it to one of the payroll people to answer your commission questions since I find commission issues confusing enough in my own state, let alone in CA where the laws can be different from the other 49. However, I do want to correct your terminology.

The term, hostile work environment, has a very specific meaning under the law. It does not mean that your manager, supervisor or co-workers are unpleasant, unfriendly, or even threatening. Unless you are being subjected to either sexual harassment or illegal discrimination/harassment under Title VII and related laws (race, religion, national origin etc.) you are not, by law, in an HWE.

There is nothing illegal about threatening an employee's job when the employee/company is doing poorly.
 

pattytx

Senior Member
You can certainly file a claim for unpaid commissions with the DLSE. It either works or it doesn't but, generally speaking, commissions earned are treated the same as regular wages in CA.
 

Eagle1

Junior Member
I did not. A co worker sent me a non-confidential file to my personal email from her work computer. I never accessed my personal email on their computers. She, on the other hand, accessed her personal email. We found out later, w/ no prior written or verbal disclosure that there was monitoring software and all company computers. Hope that clears things up.
 

JustAPal00

Senior Member
Like I said, there is nothing that is personal on a work computer. Your boss can monitor everything you do on their computer!
 

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