Latest from KEW Tips

If I terminate an employee after a 90 day probationary period, do I still have to pay Unemployment Insurance?
Most likely, yes. But, not immediately. And, possibly not ever.
Contrary to popular belief, a probationary status has no bearing on whether an employer has to pay unemployment insurance. Whether an employer plans on having its employee work for a week, a month or long-term, the employer is required to pay unemployment insurance on that employee. The employer may be
Continue Reading How do probationary periods affect Unemployment Insurance?

A common call into our office is one from a residential landlord wondering what to do in the following scenario: a tenant moved out at the end of their lease, but they left a lot of property behind, and the landlord is wondering what their options are.

Security Deposit

The magic number to remember for security deposits is 21. A landlord must return any amount of the security deposit not withheld, plus an accounting for any withholdings from the
Continue Reading Security Deposits and Abandoned Property: Post-Tenancy Considerations

In April 2022, Governor Evers Signed Wisconsin Act 258. This Act makes significant changes to the statutes for all forms of business entities – corporations, non-stock corporations, partnerships, limited partnerships and limited liability companies. This article will focus specifically on the changes to the limited liability company statutes; but it would be wise for all business entities to review their practices with an attorney to see how these changes affect their business.

The changes were made to bring Wisconsin
Continue Reading Unlearn What You Have Learned: Wisconsin’s New LLC Law

Almost every employer has faced the following situation: an employee quits without notice, and still possesses property (uniforms, equipment, keys) that belong to the company.  Or worse, the employee is disgruntled and damages property of the company on her way out.  It’s alright, I’ll just hold her last paycheck hostage until she returns the property or pays me for the damage.  Right?  Wrong.  Well, in most cases, wrong.  There seems to be a common misconception that withholding a paycheck
Continue Reading Can I Hold an Employee’s Paycheck?

In this video, Attorney Jessica M. Kramer discusses how to terminate a residential tenancy, what type of notice to use, and provides answers to some commonly asked questions.

For more information about legal issues pertaining to landlords, or ways in which KEW can assist you with landlord related inquiries, contact KEW at info@kewlaw.com.

The post Evicted: notices needed to terminate a residential tenancy in Wisconsin appeared first on Kramer, Elkins & Watt, LLC.
Continue Reading Evicted: Notices Needed to Terminate a Residential Tenancy in Wisconsin

First of all, when we say “leave” we are referring to leave as a general term of not being required to be at work. So, leave is an umbrella term that refers to vacation time, sick time, personal time,  PTO and whatever other creative term may be used to refer to time away from work.

A common misconception is that all employers are required to provide leave to their employees. However, whether or not an employer is required to
Continue Reading Do I need to provide leave to my employees?

The headline on this video clip of testimony in the trial of Johnny Depp’s case against his ex-spouse, Amber Heard, says that Amber Heard’s attorney “objects to his own question”. But did he?  What is actually happening here is that he objected to the answer, or at least he intended to do so.

He asked the witness: “You didn’t know what could cause damage to Mr. Depp’s hand while you were there on March 8, correct?”  That question, the
Continue Reading Depp v. Heard: Attorney Objects to His Own Question but Did He?

As winter rolls on, it gets tougher and tougher for even the hardiest Wisconsinites to pull themselves out of bed before work and shovel out the previous night’s snowfall. This is especially true when snow accumulates on consecutive days or the piles of snow bordering our sidewalks get to be chest high. As obnoxious as it can be, there are Madison city ordinances as well as state law that compel snow removal.
 
Madison General Ordinance (“MGO”) 10.28
 
Continue Reading Do I Really Need to Shovel Snow?

In early November, 2021, President Biden signed into law the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, a bipartisan infrastructure deal. The bill allocates approximately $1.2 trillion for infrastructure spending, including $55 billion to expand access to clean drinking water, $110 billion for roads and bridges, $66 billion for railroads, $65 billion each for power grid updates and broadband expansion to rural areas and low-income communities, $39 billion for public transit, and $21 billion for environmental cleanup such as closing old
Continue Reading The Wage and Hour Implications of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act

On January 13, The Supreme Court of the United States issued two important decisions pertaining to vaccinations in the workplace. In one ruling, the Supreme Court struck down the Biden Administration’s OSHA rule requiring employers of 100 or more individuals to implement a policy requiring their employees to either get vaccinated against COVID-19 or show a negative COVID-19 test weekly and wear a mask during the work day. In the other, the Court affirmed another Biden directive,
Continue Reading The Supreme Court Issues Opinions On Two Vaccination Mandates: What Employers Need To Know

Despite previously saying it had no plans to renew the mask mandate after a previous iteration expired on November 27, Public Health of Madison and Dane County (“PHMDC”) has issued a new mask mandate to run until January 3.
Is This Order the Same as the Previous Iterations?
Largely, yes. The current order substantially mirrors the language in the PHMDC mask mandates since September. For a refresher, you can read our KEW Tip on the previous order here. The
Continue Reading PHMDC Renews County-Wide Mask Mandate