{"id":3583,"date":"2023-02-01T09:45:22","date_gmt":"2023-02-01T14:45:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.fslawfirm.com\/blog\/?p=3583"},"modified":"2023-02-03T11:13:42","modified_gmt":"2023-02-03T16:13:42","slug":"finance-industry-fining-employees-may-not-be-legal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fslawfirm.com\/blog\/2023\/02\/finance-industry-fining-employees-may-not-be-legal\/","title":{"rendered":"Finance Industry\u00a0Fining Employees\u00a0May\u00a0Not be Legal\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Passing fines\u00a0onto employees\u00a0in\u00a0the\u00a0finance\u00a0industry may be on the rise<\/a>. Companies\u00a0such as Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, and UBS\u00a0that have been probed\u00a0and\u00a0fined\u00a0recently by the SEC for misuse of\u00a0personal devices.\u00a0Some of these financial firms\u00a0are now looking into offloading\u00a0these fines onto\u00a0their employees. In 2021, the SEC launched an investigation into\u00a0banks to see if they had been properly monitoring their employees\u2019 conversations regarding\u00a0official business.\u00a0This past September,\u00a0the\u00a0agency ended up fining 16 financial institutions, including some\u00a0big-name\u00a0banks,\u00a0$1.8 billion\u00a0after evidence\u00a0of\u00a0employees discussing\u00a0business deals and trades\u00a0on personal devices or apps such as WhatsApp.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Major global banks are looking to offset these fines by directly penalizing their employees. Morgan Stanley, which was forced to pay $200 million to federal regulators last year has already started fining some of its bankers more than $1 million dollars individually. They plan on penalizing their employees that were found misusing WhatsApp to conduct official business based on a grading system. The range of these individual employee fines will be anywhere from a few thousand dollars to over $1 million depending on the total number of messages sent and if these messages sent were a first offense or not. Morgan Stanley reportedly plans on deducting these fines from an employee\u2019s future pay or requiring payment from previously earned bonuses they have received.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, these tactics may not be legal. Docking employees\u2019 pay, or making deductions from wages that are not to an employee\u2019s benefit such as taxes, insurance, and other benefitsare generally illegal under state and federal wage and hour laws such as the Fair Labor Standards Act. Despite an employee potentially violating company rules (here by using outside communications tools) the company may not necessarily be entitled to deduct hefty sums from their hard-earned pay to bail them out of their fines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Affected financial employees during this time may include but are not limited to:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 Brokers <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 Traders<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 Bankers<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 Investment fund Managers <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2022 Financial Advisors<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you work in finance and are currently being affected or targeted due to these violations, speaking to an employment attorney could be very helpful in knowing your rights. You can reach our firm, Fitapelli & Schaffer, LLP, for a free and confidential phone consultation at (212)300-0375. You can also find additional helpful information regarding your rights here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\nPassing fines\u00a0onto employees\u00a0in\u00a0the\u00a0finance\u00a0industry may be on the rise. Companies\u00a0such as Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, and UBS\u00a0that have been probed\u00a0and\u00a0fined\u00a0recently by the SEC for misuse of\u00a0personal devices.\u00a0Some of these financial firms\u00a0are now looking into offloading\u00a0these fines onto\u00a0their employees. In 2021, the SEC launched an investigation into\u00a0banks to see if they had been properly monitoring their employees\u2019 conversations regarding\u00a0official business.\u00a0This past September,\u00a0the\u00a0agency ended up fining 16 financial institutions, including some\u00a0big-name\u00a0banks,\u00a0$1.8 billion\u00a0after evidence\u00a0of\u00a0employees discussing\u00a0business deals and trades\u00a0on personal devices or apps such …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3583","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-employment-law"],"yoast_head":"\nFinance Industry\u00a0Fining Employees\u00a0May\u00a0Not be Legal<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Read more on how the finance industry is trying to offset regulatory fines onto their employees and how it may not be legal. 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