Your boss wants to cut your pay rate. Maybe you took a job making $35 an hour, but now they want to drop it down to $25 an hour. You’re not getting fired, but this is going to significantly impact how much money you can earn.
It also may be frustrating for you, because you took the job anticipating the higher pay rate. Your budget is based around making $35 an hour, for example. Can your boss actually reduce your pay, meaning that you’ll have to spend the same number of hours at work – but you will take home significantly less in monthly wages?
They can cut your future pay
It is legal for your boss to reduce your future pay rate, in most cases. They cannot reduce the rate for hours that you have already worked. If you get paid every two weeks and your next payday is tomorrow, for example, you still deserve to get paid at your higher rate for all of those hours that you already booked. But your next paycheck could be lower, as your future wages will be paid at the new rate.
One important thing to note is that a pay reduction is illegal when it is done for discriminatory reasons. If the company isn’t making enough money and your boss is cutting pay rates across the board, that’s probably fine. But if they are just reducing your pay rate based on a protected class – your age, race, religion, or gender, for example – then your boss may be illegally discriminating against you. They also cannot legally reduce your pay rate as retaliation for something like filing a sexual harassment complaint.
If you do think your rights were violated, then you need to know exactly what legal steps to take.