Employer Changes Company Policy
By: Ashley A. Smith, Esq. and Ty Hyderally, Esq.
When an employer changes a company policy, it’s not unusual for employees to discuss and critique those changes among themselves. These discussions are usually confined to the workplace. Adjustments to absence policies, office vending machine prices, or branding changes just aren’t as thrilling to people who aren’t our coworkers.
However, one recent exception to this rule set the Tri-State area abuzz.
The Note That Started It All
It started with a note on a bulletin board.
The note stated that as of February 2022, all front-of-house service employees would be required to get five or more Google customer reviews per month “to remain employed” at the restaurant’s Edison, New Jersey location. And not just any reviews would cut the mustard – only 5-star reviews mentioning the employee by name would count. The note added that employees who collected 15 or more qualifying reviews per month would be eligible for various prizes, including restaurant merchandise, gift cards, and a mysterious “Specialty Prize.”
The Backlash Begins
Within hours, negative feedback came pouring in. A review-bombing had begun. All restaurants owned by Triple J Hospitality in New Jersey and New York were pelted with a deluge of bad reviews.
In just hours, Triple T Hospitality restaurants’ Google review pages were slammed with one-star reviews strongly disapproving of the new Google review policy and admonishing management to “do better.”
Management Fights Back
The flood of negative reviews caught the attention of digital media, who reached out to the restaurant’s owner and chief marketing officer for comment. According to owner Tommy Bonfiglio, the note was posted by a “rogue” manager without the restaurant group’s approval, was up for only 15 minutes, and the employees responsible were promptly fired.
A purported employee disputed management’s claims on social media, countering that the notice was up for over a week and no managers took issue with the policy until it received widespread attention.
In any event, scrubbers hired by the restaurant group have gotten to work on cleaning up the restaurants’ review pages in an effort to mitigate the harm to the restaurant group’s reputation.
Can an Employer Do That?
As droves of social media users expressed outrage about the Google review policy, at least one employment lawyer closely following this saga was a bit surprised to see no discussion of an important question: can they do that?
Like the other 49, New Jersey is an at-will employment state. Thus, all employees who do not have an employment contract are considered at-will employees. An employer may fire an at-will employee for any reason that isn’t illegal or discriminatory, or for no reason at all. In turn, an at-will employee is free to leave their job at any time for any reason or no reason.
In an at-will employment relationship, the employer can modify the terms of the employment relationship without notice. This may include changes to wages, benefits, or paid time off. But again, the changes cannot be illegal – like paying workers less than minimum wage – or applied in a discriminatory way – such as only lowering the pay rates of workers who are members of a legally protected class.
The reasoning of at-will employment is that, if an employer makes a legal, non-discriminatory change to the terms of employment, an employee who doesn’t like it can grin and bear it, try complaining to management or their union, or hit the road, Jack.
So, to answer our question above, an employer can put a customer review policy into place – but whether they should is another question.
As we’ve seen, employers that implement policies like the “Google review policy” risk incurring the wrath of their employees and damaging their reputations. But they may also be encouraging consumer fraud. Especially in New Jersey, a state known for having some of the strongest consumer protections in the U.S., this is not something employers want to tangle with.
What Employees Can Do
When a change has been made to your working conditions, figuring out whether your rights have been violated can be quite a challenge. The best way to get the information you need to protect your rights is to contact an employment lawyer licensed in your state.
En nuestra firma hablamos español. This blog is for informational purposes only. It does not constitute legal advice, and may not reasonably be relied upon as such. If you face a legal issue, you should consult a qualified attorney for independent legal advice with regard to your particular set of facts. This blog may constitute attorney advertising. This blog is not intended to communicate with anyone in a state or other jurisdiction where such a blog may fail to comply with all laws and ethical rules of that state of jurisdiction.
