Employee gets 'bad attitude' warning after asking why their paycheck was a week late

The modern concept of work is fairly simple. At a job, you do the duties listed and are paid for those duties within an agreed upon time frame. That’s the exchange. If something is off within that agreement, it’s fair for either party to ask the other questions why there is an issue. However, a viral Reddit thread featuring a worker getting reprimanded by their manager over a late paycheck has people wondering where the disconnect is.

In the thread, the original poster discussed about how his paycheck was late by almost a full week. Thinking that there was just a delay, they calmly asked their manager, “Hey, I haven’t been paid yet, do you know when it’ll go through?” The manager apparently gave them a look and said, “You don’t have to come at me with that kind of tone.” Hours later, the worker was called into the office and given a formal warning due to “unprofessional attitude toward management” for politely yet directly asking when to expect their payment. The paycheck appeared two days after the supposed “incident” with no apology or acknowledgment that it was late.

While this situation cannot be verified as actually happening, that didn’t stop commenters from sharing their feelings about the scenario:

“Think about lending someone money who's a delinquent. Every time you ask about it, they get offended. In fact, if they ever do respond to you, or even make a partial payment, they act like they're doing you a favor. That's what you're dealing with. Look for a new job, obviously.”

“Next time, if the pay check isn’t there, show up to work but sit in the office until they write you a check. Teach them what ‘attitude’ is.”

"’I'll sign the write-up right now if you can produce my paycheck right now.’ Honestly, any place you work at where the checks are late or the checks bounce should be your soon-to-be previous employer.”

“Every time I see this issue come up for friends or online, the company starts laying people off within six months, and most are closed within one year.”

While sharing in the original poster’s frustration, some commenters did provide some serious advice should paychecks end up late again:

“Contact your local labor board. With as much documented proof of this as possible, voice text, etc.”

“Check your labor laws, in my state they would owe you eight hours a day pay until you got paid.”

“You report late wages to your state DOL (Department of Labor) and keep your documentation of this incident for future reference. Might even ask your state DOL if what happened to you was unlawful retaliation.”

These posters providing this information are onto something. If you end up having a similar issue with your manager, you might want to approach human resources at work in order to get any issues straightened out in-house. However, if you don’t feel comfortable or fear retaliation, you may want to consider other options.

Employment law firms typically recommend gathering all of the evidence of the interaction (time of reprimand, emails, any paperwork, etc.) and researching your rights as an employee in your state, perhaps considering an employment law professional in your state. As many within Reddit mentioned, you can contact your state’s Department of Labor to see what options are available to you and what laws apply to your state. If your job is unionized, you’ll likely want to contact your union representative and see what if any support you may receive from them, especially if an issue ends up going to court.

Hopefully, whatever issue there may be can be rectified before involving the law, but it's best to be prepared and knowledgeable of your rights within any situation.