The Board of Industrial Insurance Appeals (BIIA) in Washington State The Board of Industrial Insurance Appeals is part of Washington State's workers' compensation system. It serves as an independent administrative agency responsible for hearing appeals of decisions made by the Department of Labor...
[caption id="attachment_44168" align="aligncenter" width="525"] Photo credit: iStockphoto.com/zimmytws[/caption] Generally speaking, workers’ compensation is available to any employee who is injured or acquires certain types of illnesses at the workplace, or during work-related activities, accord...
[caption id="attachment_25992" align="aligncenter" width="525"] Photo credit: iStockphoto.com/Cylonphoto[/caption] A Washington state congresswoman has drafted legislation to protect workers from having to pay back federal pandemic unemployment assistance if agencies mistakenly pay them these benefi...
Workers in the meat-processing industry may be on the chopping block in the final weeks of the Trump administration. Less than a week after Joe Biden was declared the winner of the presidential election, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) released news of a proposed regulatory change to spe...
The Washington Department of Labor and Industries (L&I), which has been monitoring whether businesses are following coronavirus guidelines to keep workers safe, is also in charge of accepting or rejecting claims filed on behalf of injured or ill workers to the state’s workers’ compensation...
[caption id="attachment_19715" align="aligncenter" width="525"] Photo credit: iStock.com/vlastas[/caption] Workers who were exposed to toxic substances at the Hanford Nuclear Site in central Washington state may finally have a clearer path to workers’ compensation benefits, if newly proposed fede...
As Washington’s economy gradually reopens as part of Gov. Jay Inslee’s Safe Start plan, concerns from both businesses and employees about who will be responsible in the event of a workplace outbreak are rising. The phased economic opening is proceeding on a county-wide basis contingent on the...
After several weeks of government-mandated business closures and social restrictions, the coronavirus conversation is starting to shift to a new phase: how to reopen the economy amid the legal uncertainties surrounding worker protections. One of the central questions state officials are debating in...
McDonald’s announced Monday that it will settle a U.S. labor board case on whether the company is responsible for labor law violations committed by its franchisees. The settlement is now pending approval by a National Labor Relations Board judge, but if successful it would allow McDonald’s to...
Just in the last two years, Google, Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft, and Oracle have been hit with high-profile lawsuits over to their employment practices. And while those were the cases that made headlines, workers in nearly every sector sue their bosses for unpaid wages, discrimination and verbal a...