Have you found yourself in a position where your employer is withholding your salary? If so, you need to take action. This is most often illegal and you need to hold the employer accountable if you want to receive all payments that you have earned.
Illegal salary withholdings can take the form of many different things, like overtime, regular pay, illegal deductions, or paying less than minimum wage. You are legally entitled to all the wages you earned from working.
3 Steps to Take if Your Employer is Withholding Your Salary
Don’t let your employer cheat you out of your salary. Wage theft is all too common. You must require your employer to pay you all of your earned wages. Employers will try to short your wages to illegally save all the money the employer can.
- Talk To Your Employer
The first step in finding out why your employer is withholding your salary is to ask them. Find out from your immediate supervisor or payroll if there was a mistake or oversight.
Perhaps, the employer didn’t get the timesheets timely entered or the employer made a genuine mistake that impacted your pay.
It’s just a good idea to make sure the employer did not have a technical error or any kind of problem that kept you from getting your money.
You should make sure payroll has all your timesheets and the most recent record of hours you worked. Small mistakes can happen. However, employers rarely make errors in paying employees. Also, the employer should readily admit its error and pay you if the employer erred in paying you.
- Contact the Department of Labor
One option to seek outside help with obtaining your unpaid salary is to file a complaint with the Department of Labor (“DOL”). The DOL will accept your complaint if the DOL believes it has merit. The DOL often takes months to determine if your complaint has merit. If so, the DOL will investigate your complaint and try to make the employer pay. This can take years. The DOL often recovers fewer wages than private employment attorneys recover. Thus, most persons use an employment attorney to file a claim for unpaid salary. You do not need to file a DOL complaint before you hire an employment attorney.
Your employer will likely be angry that you are calling them out and double down. They will likely call their lawyer at this point to start fighting to not pay you.
- Contact an Employment Lawyer
The wage laws are very clear about employers having to pay employees on time and for everything they are owed. Employers cannot illegally withhold your salary to be spiteful or because the employer wants some kind of retribution.
An employment lawyer can give you a clear outline of how to proceed to collect your unpaid salary.
You may be entitled to more compensation than just your unpaid salary if your employer is breaking the law. You may be entitled to additional monies including interest, liquidated damages, penalties, and fees and costs. If your employer is withholding your salary, the employer is likely doing it to many others, as well. There may be a good reason to start an unpaid lawsuit that includes you and other employees who work for the same employer.
Let your employment lawyer take control.
Your lawyer will guide you on how to best assert your unpaid wages claim.
Don’t Let Your Employer Withhold Your Salary
Why wait? If you can’t get your pay from your employer, call a lawyer to do it for you. You have rights and your employment lawyer is there to help you fight and protect them.
Give us a call here at Rowdy Meeks Legal Group LLC. We have the knowledge and experience to help you get the money you worked hard to earn. You spend a lot of time at your job and work hard for your pay. You deserve all of the pay to which you are legally entitled.