Previous post here: https://www.reddit.com/r/antiwork/comments/tzh8kw/wife_was_fired_today_for_discussing_wages_at_work/
This is an update to the post I made about 3 months ago, which you can read about in the link above. After my wife was fired we immediately filed a wrongful termination claim with our state's LNI (Department of Labor and Industries). Also, we sent a letter to the employer asking for the exact reason for termination, which is required for employers to provide within 10 business days of receiving notice. The letter we got back was two entire sentences and the only reason they provided was “She was not a good fit” with no other elaboration. My guess is this isn't sufficient to meet the requirements of notification under the state law otherwise the law is completely pointless, however I haven't looked too deeply into that yet.
After we made the claim to LNI, the employer had an attorney write up a statement full of lies and falsehoods, where they tried to claim to LNI that my wife was let go for a different reason. The employer must have recovered from amnesia after their previous letter to us saying “she was not a good fit” because in the letter to LNI they seem to have finally remembered a reason why she was let go. However, their story did not add up and we were able to explain this to the LNI case worker in a point by point summary of the facts. The co-worker (who had quit shortly after the incident) was able to repudiate a number of the points in their story, not the least of which was definitive proof that she was being paid below minimum wage. The employer tried to claim that the payroll company was at fault for the wage issue which was pretty infuriating considering the co-worker had explicitly asked for a raise months after the minimum wage hike and was told no. The co-worker was also not being given sick leave pay, another requirement by the state, but I guess the payroll company must have messed that up too.
It seems like the LNI case worker didn't buy their BS either because a few days ago we were notified that they concluded the former employer was in violation of the state's wage discussion and retaliation laws.
The next step is to see if we can come to an agreement on how to resolve this matter before legal action (which would be preferable). We did not do this for money, but employers need to be held accountable for their actions, so we are going to seek compensation. My wife has been a bit hesitant because she felt humiliated by the entire situation and doesn't want to be in the same room as her former boss, but if people don't stand up for themselves then nothing will ever change.