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I live in a right-to-work state. I work for a nonprofit gym chain watching children while their parents work out. The gym does not allow their employees to take outside babysitting jobs with their members (although doing so would not take business away from the gym). They claim it's for the safety of the children, which makes no sense to me. Shouldn't that be between the parent(s) and the potential babysitter, not the gym unless it's on their property during the employee's work hours? I recently had a mother I had met via watching her child at the gym ask me to babysit her child at home for date nights with her husband. I told her I would think about it. Can my employer legally prohibit me from taking this job just because she is a member? Isn't that against right-to-work laws? Are they allowed to tell me what I can and cannot do when I am off the clock?
TIA!!!
The question is whether you work in an "employment-at-will" state or not; "right-to-work" has nothing to do with it.
Your employer can set policy as they see fit, provided it does not violate existing federal and state law, and any collective bargaining agreement that might be in place. Issues of moonlighting are general fair game, and most companies I've seen have policies limiting it.
Whether you see it as being fair or not is irrelevant. If you don't agree with the policy, you should find other employment.
My sister in law is a bartender. She often gets referred for weddings or other corporate events. Her employer has zero say in how she earns money outside her scheduled work hours with them. Nor are they "liable" for her services at another side event. The key in her job is to follow the laws on serving. She has many a time cut off a patron.
In high level positions it's more likely that non competes are the norm. It protects the industry from selling/telling sensitive information .
Nov3, I think you make a good point. I don't see any liability to the facility if OP takes a babysitting job. This is a private business agreement with no direct referral from the facility.
That said, I can understand the facility discouraging OP from soliciting outside work while on duty.
My opinion is it's OP's decision to make, understanding that she can be terminated if she does perform outside work from a current customer.
This is a question of risk vs. reward. She does have risk of being terminated, however her current position is likely limited hours, low wage, and not likely to make a great impact on a future resume. This minimizes the risk.
If I were in this same situation I would advise the customer to call OP after work hours to explain the employer expectations and ask that any agreement be kept confidential.
I live in a right-to-work state. I work for a nonprofit gym chain watching children while their parents work out. The gym does not allow their employees to take outside babysitting jobs with their members (although doing so would not take business away from the gym). They claim it's for the safety of the children, which makes no sense to me. Shouldn't that be between the parent(s) and the potential babysitter, not the gym unless it's on their property during the employee's work hours? I recently had a mother I had met via watching her child at the gym ask me to babysit her child at home for date nights with her husband. I told her I would think about it. Can my employer legally prohibit me from taking this job just because she is a member? Isn't that against right-to-work laws? Are they allowed to tell me what I can and cannot do when I am off the clock?
TIA!!!
Right-to-work state has nothing to do with any of this. Being a non-profit doesn't either.
Yes, the employer can restrict you from working for competition or engaged in other types of work that might be on conflict with their company. There is most likely a scheduling and liability of why they don't want you to do this. If this client met through their company, and there is a problem, it could come back to them that they are responsible for you, such as a lawsuit. They also might want you to be available on short-notice such as your day off or different hours to do work, and don't want you to have outside work conflicts.
If you have a signed employment agreement and/or it refers to a company handbook which states what you can and can't do, then you have agreed to this. They can't prevent you from doing anything, but they can fire and sue you.
Large companies who hire tons of engineers have restricted what kind of free-lance work they can take and have a process of how it must be cleared with them first.
If they are paying you, they own you if you agreed to their terms.
This is common for employers. In your circumstance, they likely have the rule to prohibit you from soliciting work from the customers. I was a teacher and we were not allowed to charge money to tutor our own students. We could tutor them for free, but not profit. I could tutor someone else's students for pay. Just not my own.
While non-compete is not as much of an issue here as soliciting, most employers do have a stipulation regarding second jobs. Typically, you cannot work two jobs within the same industry. Even my high school/college job in a grocery story prohibited you from working in another grocery store.
Employers can also prohibit second jobs in general. In a retail position, they will enforce this by saying you must have an open availability. At least a full time position will do this. Part time is less likely.
I worked two jobs for most of my adult life. After college, I was substitute teaching and working in a grocery store. While teaching, I worked nights and weekends at a car dealership, craft store, and grocery store. Always completely different fields.
The question is whether you work in an "employment-at-will" state or not; "right-to-work" has nothing to do with it.
I don't know why on this forum, people seem to think at "at will" and "right to work" are some kind of protection systems in place that any time they have the slightest complaint or grievance that they can evoke that and the employer is going to get slammed down by some imaginary governing body coming to their rescue.
Once again, any employer can fire you for any reason or no reason. Any employer can put together any sort of rules they wish, and can fire you for not following them. They can also make up rules, keep them secret, and still fire you for a perceived violation of any of them. You can meet or exceed all your established goals, and still be fired.
I live in a right-to-work state. I work for a nonprofit gym chain watching children while their parents work out. The gym does not allow their employees to take outside babysitting jobs with their members (although doing so would not take business away from the gym). They claim it's for the safety of the children, which makes no sense to me. Shouldn't that be between the parent(s) and the potential babysitter, not the gym unless it's on their property during the employee's work hours? I recently had a mother I had met via watching her child at the gym ask me to babysit her child at home for date nights with her husband. I told her I would think about it. Can my employer legally prohibit me from taking this job just because she is a member? Isn't that against right-to-work laws? Are they allowed to tell me what I can and cannot do when I am off the clock?
TIA!!!
What does right to work have to do with anything?
The gym can't prohibit you from taking outside work even if it's with parents of the kids you watch at the gym. They can fire you if you do and they find out about it.
I live in a right-to-work state. I work for a nonprofit gym chain watching children while their parents work out. The gym does not allow their employees to take outside babysitting jobs with their members (although doing so would not take business away from the gym). They claim it's for the safety of the children, which makes no sense to me. Shouldn't that be between the parent(s) and the potential babysitter, not the gym unless it's on their property during the employee's work hours? I recently had a mother I had met via watching her child at the gym ask me to babysit her child at home for date nights with her husband. I told her I would think about it. Can my employer legally prohibit me from taking this job just because she is a member? Isn't that against right-to-work laws? Are they allowed to tell me what I can and cannot do when I am off the clock?
TIA!!!
I think half the threads on this forum deal with "can my employee require me to do this". Why do you guys keep on asking this? In almost all cases the answer is YES (that is, they can make this a provision of employment) unless they are asking you to do something illegal or it involves some form of discrimination against a protected class. It's there business, they have the RIGHT to manage it as they see fit.
If you don't like it, you likewise have the right to tell them to go stuff it and then find another job.
In this case this would be conflict of interest as you would potentially solicit for outside jobs when you are performing your own job, and the parents can misinterpret that you are still a company employee and thus covered under company policy, insurance, etc while you are engaging in personal business. Don't argue, I've been through these issues while I was an internal auditor - it's clearly and unarguably a conflict of interest PERIOD.
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