The IRS has made it easier to deduct a home office, starting in 2013. In the past, the home office deduction was very difficult to document, and the IRS was very suspicious of it. Even people who could legitimately claim the deduction were often hesitant to do so for fear that it could trigger an audit. This year, though, the IRS has created a “safe harbor” for taxpayers. You might not be able to deduct every

Companies that want to hire foreign workers with specialized skills and expertise are facing a growing bottleneck with the H-1B visa program, which allows skilled foreign employees a visa if they are sponsored by an American employer. The number of visas is capped at 65,000 a year, with an additional 20,000 possible under a special program for applicants with master’s degrees and doctorates. This year, the government was flooded with 124,000 applications, and the cap was

More and more companies are allowing employees to work from home. That can be great … but working from home raises a lot of legal issues that many managers simply aren’t aware of. If you allow telecommuting – even if you allow it for only a few employees, or only part of the time – it’s a good idea to have a written policy that will protect you if questions arise or if something goes wrong.

If you use an outside agency to perform background checks on employees or job applicants, then a federal law called the Fair Credit Reporting Act requires you to provide a form to any person if you take adverse action against them based on the results of the report. This form summarizes the rights of the employee or applicant under the law. You should note that a new form is required to be used starting in 2013.

As of March 2013, the way that patents are granted in the U.S. has undergone a radical change. For more than 200 years, when two or more people claimed to have invented something, the key question was who actually invented it first. Starting now, however, the key question will be who was the first to file a patent application. This means that the second person to invent something might nevertheless “win” the patent simply by winning

The new tax law that resolved the “fiscal cliff” back in January will prompt many more companies to offer their employees a Roth 401(k) plan in addition to a traditional 401(k) plan. In a traditional 401(k) plan, employees contribute pre-tax earnings, the assets grow tax-free, and an employee can withdraw them at retirement age and pay ordinary income tax on the withdrawals. With a Roth 401(k), employees contribute post-tax earnings, but when they withdraw the assets

A large number of business contracts contain some “boilerplate” language to the effect that any disputes will be resolved by arbitration. That’s fine – but a good arbitration clause should be a little more specific, and should resolve the most common sorts of questions that tend to arise when problems actually do go to arbitration. After all, the point of an arbitration clause is to provide a quick, inexpensive resolution of disputes. So why allow an

More and more businesses are allowing employees to use their own laptops, tablets and smartphones for work, instead of providing the equipment themselves. About a third of all large companies in the U.S. now have a “bring your own device” policy, and about half of smaller companies do. These policies have a lot of advantages, but they can also create security and legal risks. If you have such a policy, or you’re thinking of adopting one,

Companies advertise all the time saying that their products are terrific and better than the competition. But at what point can a company be sued if a product doesn’t live up to the hype? That question came up recently when a customer sued Apple, claiming that his iBook G4 laptop failed shortly after the one-year limited warranty ran out. (He claimed that certain solder joints degraded each time to laptop was turned on and off, resulting

Any business whose employees drive or use the telephone should probably consider having a written policy on cell phone use while driving. Why? Because if an employee causes an accident while driving on business…or causes an accident while driving on their own time, but while texting or making a phone call related to the business…then it’s possible that someone who was injured in the accident will sue the company, and try to hold it liable as