Help Wanted: Exit routes in the workplace

-- Big-Boxed In

"Simply put, exit routes must not be blocked or locked," said Tony Ciuffo, who heads the Westbury office.

The only exceptions, he said, are exit doors that may be locked in a mental or correctional facility. Even then, supervisory personnel must be continuously on duty, and the employer must have an evacuation plan, he said.

"This exemption does not apply to the vast majority of workplaces," he said.

He noted that locked exit doors caused one of the deadliest industrial disasters in New York City's history -- the 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in which 146 workers died.

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"Because the managers had locked the doors to the stairwells and exits -- a common practice at the time to prevent pilferage and unauthorized breaks -- many of the workers who could not escape the burning building jumped from the eighth, ninth, and tenth floors to the streets below," he said.

A similar problem led to the death of 119 workers at a Chinese poultry-processing plant earlier this month, he said.

Contact OSHA at 516-334-3344.

-- Driven to Complain

Getting paid an earned commission and collecting unemployment benefits have nothing to do with each other. Commissions are considered wages and have to be paid once they are earned. State labor law requires employers to pay employees' commissions by no later than the last day of the month following the month in which the commission was earned. So if a commission is earned in June, it must be paid by July 31.

And none of that depends on whether an employee is receiving unemployment benefits. When employees lose a job through no fault of their own, they may be eligible for unemployment benefits, providing they meet other criteria.

For more on OSHA exit route regulations, go to http://1.usa.gov/17TvPjY; for a claim form for unpaid commissions go to http://bit.ly/12QPRun