NLRB: A Burger King GM Telling Employees They Could Not Discuss Wages Was Unlawful
Reminder: Employees Section Seven Rights Include The Right To Discuss Wages
A Burger King franchise in Billings, Montana was found by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to have violated federal law when it told its non-union employees that they could not discuss wages with one another.
The case serves as a good reminder for employers (and their managers) that barring employees from discussing their wages, hours of work, and other terms and conditions of work is unlawful.
The allegations are undisputed. In a charge filed by an individual last year, a Utah-based Burger King franchisee’s general manager in Billings, Montana allegedly* “verbally instructed employees not to discuss wages,” “by text message, told employees that they could not discuss wages and that doing so was against company policy” and, also by text, “threatened employees with discharge if they discussed wages.”
However, *as a result of the Respondent employer never responding to the allegations, nor even responding to the National Labor Relations Board, the “allegations in the motion are therefore undisputed.”
In its ruling last week, the NLRB concluded “the Respondent has been interfering with, restraining, and coercing employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed in Section 7 of the Act in violation of Section 8(a)(1) of the Act.”
Section Seven Rights. Under Section Seven of the National Labor Relations Act, whether unionized or not, employees have rights that are protected under federal law.
Those rights include, the right of employees to discuss wages.
“If you are an employee covered by the Act, you may discuss wages in face-to-face conversations and written messages,” the NLRB states on its website.
“Protected conversations about wages may take on many forms, including having conversations about how much you and your colleagues and managers make, presenting joint requests concerning pay to your employer; organizing a union to raise your wages; approaching an outside union for help in bargaining with your employer over pay; and approaching the National Labor Relations Board for more information on your rights under the NLRA.”
Although the Burger King franchise never disputed the allegations and, therefore, was found to have committed an unfair labor practice, for other employers—including and especially non-union employers—the case serves as a good reminder that the National Labor Relations Act prohibits employers (and their managers or supervisors) from barring employees from discussing their wages, hours of work, or other terms and conditions of employment.