The Schwab Employee Rights Case

Employers cannot unlawfully condition your job, wages, or even a severance payment on the waiver or relinquishment of certain important rights.   Your name, face and likeness belong to you.  So does your voice.  So does the trade or profession you choose to practice.

Nevertheless, Charles Schwab & Co. and its affiliates (“Schwab”) require employees to sign documents that grant it the right to sell or use their name, likeness and voice, forever, “in any and all media worldwide,” as Schwab sees fit.  It also requires employees to waive any claims that might arise from the misuse or abuse of their likeness, even if the misuse is defamatory or an invasion of a current or former employees’ right to privacy.    

Schwab – through overbroad and inappropriate confidentiality provisions and designations – also restrains its current and former employees’ rights by asserting the right to control information about wages, working conditions, and other subjects, including unlawful conduct.  It prohibits employees from soliciting customers, clients, and co-workers for up to 18 months if they leave Schwab’s employ.  Indeed, Schwab goes so far to as require employees to disconnect on LinkedIn from client contacts they have served and known – sometimes for years – if they ever leave Schwab’s employ.  This is unfair to employees and clients.

Fortunately, the law gives employees the right to their own likeness and voice.  “The protection of name and likeness from unwarranted intrusion or exploitation is the heart of the law of privacy.”  Lugosi v. Universal Pictures (1979) 25 Cal.3d 813, 824.  Other laws establish an employee anti-gag rule that gives current and former employees the right to freedom of speech, to whistle-blow, and to compete.  Doe v. Google (2020) 54 Cal.App.5th 948, 961; Edwards v. Arthur Andersen LLP (2008) 44 Cal.4th 937, 946.

Schwab has described employees as a firm’s “most important asset,” i.e., resource with economic value that the firm owns or controls.  Employees are more than assets.  They are individuals with intrinsic rights. 

For these reasons, a First Amended Complaint has been filed against Schwab on behalf of its current and former employees and the State of California.  Schwab must abandon its unlawful employment practices and protect and abide by the rights of its employees. 

If you are a current or former Schwab employee based in California, have information about the employment practices referenced above, or would like to share how Schwab’s practices have affected your rights, please send us a message using the on-line form on this webpage. You can also contact us at 415-433-1064.