Third Thursday Webinar: Crowell & Moring’s Labor and Employment Update

Please join us for the next edition of Third Thursday – Crowell & Moring’s Labor and Employment Update, a webinar series dedicated to helping our clients stay on top of developing law and emerging compliance issues.

Arbitration is widely viewed by U.S. businesses as a less expensive way of resolving disputes. Many corporations require arbitration of disputes raised by employees, customers and vendors. The Supreme Court’s decision earlier this year in Epic Systems v. Lewis resolved important questions about the enforceability of mandatory arbitration under the National Labor Relations Act, in situations where the arbitration agreements bar class actions. Yet many questions remain. Companies continue to face litigation over the enforceability of such agreements, including questions about the authority of arbitrators to resolve threshold issues, and ongoing disputes over the fundamental fairness of arbitration agreements. For example, Uber recently won an appeal in federal court to enforce its arbitration agreement which bars class claims. The Supreme Court is scheduled to decide at least three more cases this term regarding the scope of mandatory arbitration, including the question presented in New Prime Inc. v. Oliveira of whether the Federal Arbitration Act bars arbitration of wage and hour claims brought by individuals characterized as independent contractors.  Finally, state governments are beginning to implement laws that restrict the use of mandatory arbitration agreements, especially in the context of arbitration of sexual assault and harassment allegations.  

Our panelists will discuss these issues, as part of a broader discussion of the current state of the law in a program of interest to employers that have already implemented, or are now contemplating adoption of, mandatory arbitration programs.