I've noticed a pattern where I work: older workers tend to be laid off just before their pension rights lock in or vest. Is that legal?

I've noticed a pattern where I work: older workers tend to be laid off just before their pension rights lock in or vest. Is that legal?

Using various ploys like this one to cheat workers out of their promised pensions is a technique some employers use to save money. But it's not legal. When the Federal Older Workers Benefit Protection Act was passed in 1990, it became clearly illegal for employers:

• to use an employee's age as the basis for discrimination in benefits, and
• to target older workers for their staff cutting programs.

Does the law restrict my employer from offering a Golden Parachute -- a benefits package that seems contrived to get me into early retirement?

Maybe. One provision of the Older Workers Benefit Protection Act regulates the legal waivers that employers are increasingly asking employees to sign in connection with so-called early retirement programs.

If your employer offers you the opportunity to participate in a staff reduction program, the Act indirectly puts you in a position to negotiate the terms of your departure. The fact that your employer has offered an incentive suggests that the company wants you gone and is worried that you might file a lawsuit for wrongful discharge. So, although the company may say that you have only two choices -- accept or reject the offer -- there is nothing preventing you from making a counteroffer.

My employer has asked me to sign an agreement waiving my rights to sue. What does this really mean?

A growing number of employers ask older workers to sign waivers -- also called releases or agreements not to sue. In return for signing the waivers, the employer offers the employee an incentive to leave the job voluntarily, such as a significant amount of severance pay. The Older Workers Benefit Protection Act places a number of restrictions on such waivers:

• Your employer must make the waiver understandable to the people who are likely to use it.
  
  
• The waiver may not cover any rights or claims that you discover are available after you sign it, and it must specify that it covers your rights under the Federal Age Discrimination in Employment Act.
  
  
• Your employer must offer you something of value (such as severance pay) over and above what is already owed to you in exchange for your signature on the waiver.
  
  
• Your employer must advise you, in writing, that you have the right to consult an attorney before you sign the waiver.
  
  
• If the offer is being made to a group or class of employees, your employer must inform you in writing how the class of employees is defined; the job titles and ages of all the individuals to whom the offer is being made; and the ages of all the employees in the same job classification or unit of the company to whom the offer is not being made.
  
  
• You must be given a fixed time in which to make a decision on whether or not to sign the waiver.

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