Underpaying Employees of our HOA

Florida - We have a CAM(Condo Assoc.Manager)age 50,who for the past 5 years has been on SSI. She is too ill to work full time, is on Social Security disability. She is not allowed to make a salary for more than 11.5 hours per week, but works more than 30 hours. Our Assoc. pays her only 11.5 hours worth. This past Sept. 2010 she was notified that she made too much money & social security dropped her. Now she's reapplying (6 mos. wait). If she get's reinstated, is our HOA breaking disability laws by not paying her what she works? I feel she is defrauding the government by claiming to work only 11.5 hours, but working 30+ hours per week. I too feel we are defrauding the govnt. too by accommodating her wage situation. Should we get legal advice.

Sounds like it's HER problem.
You have a job position that requires 30 hours.
She needs to decide if she wants to take it or stay on SSI. That's between her, her Dr. and the SSA.
The HOA has done nothing wrong. Just be sure you issue her a valid employee's check, with all deductions verified.

Heresy it is not. I am on the Board of Directors & Personnel Committee. We talked of this, have the letter from Social Security & saw when & why they stopped paying her the disability pay she was getting. At the same time, she has now reapplied and 5 months from now we'll (the Association) be back again facing the same situation. My concern is that we're putting the Association in a compromising situation by accommodating this, and to go further, am I opening up myself as a BOD for being sued down the road?

Linda,

I must agree with Donna. The assn is also committing fraud by only paying her for working 11.5 hrs instead of the 30+ hrs she works, because the board knows she will lose her SSI if she claims to be working more than 11.5 hrs.

IMO, the board needs to let this person go and find a mgr who is NOT on SSI and can legally work the number of hours required to perform their job!

It is NOT the HOA's responsibility to monitor the personal finances of its employees or vendors.

She's a big girl and knows what she's doing. She knows exactly how much she can earn before her SSI gets reduced or dropped.

If you have a 30 hour job, then hire someone who can work 30 hours. If this is something she is willing to do for 11.5 hours pay, then so be it.

If the Association wishes to keep this person and avoid issues, they should contract her services for a set fee vs. hourly. This way, how many hours the individual works is up to her. The Association is only expecting the duties to be performed that they paid a set amount for. If the individual can complete those duties in 1 hr or 100 hrs it makes no difference to the Association.

Now lets talk about ethics. The Board has been made aware that the person they contracted services from appears to be unethical - based on the original posters posting. Does the Association desire to maintain a working relationship with a person of questionable ethics? If they do wish to keep this working relationship, should they minimize any lapse in ethics by removing any finances from this persons control?

The Board can easily minimize possible repercussions to the Association by modifying the contract to a fee for service vs. fee for hours worked contract.
That's an easy decision. The tougher decisions come when it involves ethics.

Tim

But she is an employee, not a director. She has already proven she is unethical. Would you really want someone who is good at fudging number in charge of your finances. LOL. Give me a break!