The National Labor Relations Board has officially stuck its nose in your ability to set computer and social network use policies.
A settlement has been reached in a case involving the discharge of a Connecticut ambulance service employee for posting negative comments about her supervisor on her Facebook page.
The NLRB complaint against American Medical Response of Connecticut said the company violated federal labor law when it fired Dawnmarie Souza after she posted the remarks.
The board said the company maintained overly-broad rules in its employee handbook regarding blogging, Internet posting, and communications between employees. It also said the employer had illegally denied union representation to the Souza during the investigation of a customer complaint.
Company agrees to policy changes
Under the settlement, the company agreed to revise its computer-use rules to ensure employees wouldn’t be restricted from discussing their wages, hours and working conditions with co-workers.
The company also promised that employee requests for union representation will not be denied in the future.
The allegations involving the employee’s discharge were resolved through a separate, private agreement between the employee and the company, according to an NLRB press release.
The case was the first instance of the NLRB formally alleging an employer violated federal law by disciplining a worker who posted critical comments on social-network sites.
We’re betting it’s not the last.
