Legal Question in Employment Law in Washington

Re: work restictions

It is hard to guess what your employer is thinking based on the short email from you, but I get the impression they are concerned that if you make your injury worse while on the job, that will hurt their L & I premium rate. Or they may have other liability concerns. Anyway, I get the impression they are trying to just give you "light work" even though your doctor said you were fit for your regular job. I'm also assuming that they don't have enough "light work" to keep you busy longer than 1-4 hours/day.

Their thinking is inaccurate, but whether you have any options to force them to give you more hours would depend on some additional details. Some things to think about:

Are you a union member? If so, your union contract may address this kind of problem. Talk with your shop steward or union rep.

Do you have reason to believe that the claim of concern about your injury is pretext for some other motive for cutting your hours? If you are a member of a protected group (for example, if you are over 40 or if there is possible gender discrimination) you may have a possible employment discrimination claim.

If there is no union, and if you do not think your employer has a hidden (discriminatory) reason to cut your hours, you may not have a practical way to force them to put you back on a full time schedule under Washington law. You do have the option of resigning and drawing unemployment (you should qualify, because they have cut your hours by 25% or more) but that is probably not a practical solution, particularly if your employer is covering your medical insurance.

By the way, if you do get medical insurance coverage through your employer, you should check and make sure that coverage is continuing even while you have reduced hours. If not, (and if your employer has 20 or more employees and is not a government entity) you may want to ask them why they haven't sent you notice of your rights to continued coverage under COBRA. This would be a legal violation. Also, you do not want that medical coverage to get away while you are dealing with medical problems, and sometimes coverage will lapse if your hours fall below a certain level.

Washington is an "at will" state, which means the employer can normally cut your hours for any reason, unless you have a contract (including a union contract), or unless they are doing so for a discriminatory reason.

It would seem to me that if the written safety occurrence says that you can return to work with a doctor's release, and you provided the doctor's release, your employer has a possible breach of contract problem, but I would need more details.

Good luck!