Employment Law Practice Areas

Who does TA Legal Group represent?

We represent employees and executives in the great majority of our matters, and employers in a limited number of them. We run a conflict check before taking any case. Every case on this site is brought on behalf of the person who was underpaid, harassed, denied an accommodation, or pushed out of a job.

That is where the practice is built and where nearly all of its work sits. The firm also represents employers in a limited number of matters, so we run a conflict check before taking any case and tell you at the first conversation if we cannot act for you.

Most people arrive with one of three problems: the paycheck is wrong, they were treated differently because of who they are, or they were punished after speaking up. Those map to wage-and-hour claims, discrimination claims, and retaliation claims, and one set of facts often supports more than one of them. An employee fired weeks after complaining about unpaid overtime may have both a wage claim under the New York Labor Law and a separate retaliation claim, each with its own deadline and its own damages.

How is this section organized?

Each page below covers one claim type in plain language: what the law actually requires you to show, what evidence tends to matter, how long you have to file, and what a recovery can include. Start with the page closest to your situation. If you were fired, start with wrongful termination. If your pay is short, start with wage and hour class actions. If you were treated differently because of your race, sex, age, disability, religion, pregnancy, or national origin, start with workplace discrimination. Sub-topic pages sit under each of those and go deeper into a single claim.

Deadlines are the part people underestimate. A federal discrimination charge generally must reach the EEOC within 300 days in New York. State and City Human Rights Law claims generally allow three years. Unpaid wage claims under the New York Labor Law reach back six years. Because the shortest applicable deadline controls whether a claim survives at all, the safe assumption is that the clock started the day the conduct happened.

Fee arrangements depend on the matter. Many employee-side cases are handled on a contingency fee basis, where there is no fee unless we recover for you and case costs and disbursements are advanced by the firm and reimbursed from any recovery. Other matters are handled on a retainer, and we tell you in writing which applies before you commit to anything. The initial consultation is always free and confidential. If you are not sure which category fits what happened to you, that is normal, and sorting it out is our job, not yours. Contact us and describe the situation, or read more about the firm and our attorneys first.

Where we can help

Wage & Hour Class and Collective Actions
A wage and hour class or collective action lets a group of employees sue one employer together over the same illegal pay practice. If your employer underpaid you, it almost certainly underpaid your coworkers the same way, and New York law lets you recover the unpaid wages, an equal amount again in liquidated damages, interest, and your attorneys' fees.
Learn more about Wage & Hour Class and Collective Actions
Wrongful Termination Lawyers Serving New York
New York is an at-will employment state, but "at-will" does not mean an employer can fire you for any reason. Termination is illegal when it is based on a protected characteristic, retaliates against protected activity, or breaches a contract.
Learn more about Wrongful Termination Lawyers Serving New York
Workplace Discrimination
Workplace discrimination is when an employer treats you worse in a term or condition of employment because of a protected characteristic (race, sex, age, disability, religion, national origin, pregnancy, sexual orientation, gender identity, and more). New York State and New York City law protect more workers, cover more characteristics, and impose a lower proof burden than federal law does.
Learn more about Workplace Discrimination
Sexual Harassment and Assault
Sexual harassment at work is unlawful in New York under federal, state, and city law. You do not have to be touched, propositioned, or fired for the conduct to be illegal, and since 2019 New York law no longer requires you to prove the harassment was "severe or pervasive."
Learn more about Sexual Harassment and Assault
Retaliation and Whistleblower Claims
Retaliation is when an employer punishes you for doing something the law protects (reporting discrimination, complaining about unpaid wages, requesting an accommodation, or blowing the whistle on illegal conduct). It is unlawful even when the underlying complaint turns out to be wrong, as long as you believed it in good faith.
Learn more about Retaliation and Whistleblower Claims
Disability Discrimination and ADA Accommodation
If you have a disability and your employer refused to discuss an accommodation, denied one without a real reason, or punished you for asking, that is usually unlawful. New York State and New York City law define disability far more broadly than the ADA, and cover employers too small for federal law to reach.
Learn more about Disability Discrimination and ADA Accommodation
Severance Agreements and Employment Contracts
A severance agreement is a contract in which your employer pays you money in exchange for your permanent release of legal claims. You are almost never required to sign it, the first offer is usually not the employer's best offer, and once you sign, the claims you gave up are gone.
Learn more about Severance Agreements and Employment Contracts
Employment Litigation
Employment litigation is the process of enforcing your workplace rights in court or before an agency when an employer breaks the law. Most New York cases start with an administrative charge or a complaint filed in state or federal court, move through discovery, and resolve by settlement, but the cases that settle well are the ones built as if they will be tried.
Learn more about Employment Litigation
Where to File a Discrimination Complaint in New York
New York gives you more than one place to bring a discrimination complaint, and the choice is close to irreversible. Filing with the State Division of Human Rights, or with a county or city human rights commission, generally extinguishes your right to sue on those same facts under the State Human Rights Law. Filing a charge with the EEOC does not, even though the EEOC routinely forwards that charge to the Division. Almost nobody is told this before they file.
Learn more about Where to File a Discrimination Complaint in New York
Healthcare and Hospital Employees
New York gives health care workers two separate whistleblower statutes, a law limiting when a nurse can be forced to work past the end of a shift, and the same wage protections every hourly employee has. Hospitals are large, well-advised institutions, and the details of those rules are what decide these cases.
Learn more about Healthcare and Hospital Employees
Non-Competes and Restrictive Covenants
A non-compete is neither automatically valid nor banned in New York. Whether one can be enforced against you turns on what it actually restricts, what the employer is genuinely protecting, and how you left. For executives, the clause that costs the most money is usually not the non-compete at all, but a forfeiture provision buried in an equity or deferred compensation plan.
Learn more about Non-Competes and Restrictive Covenants