This one belongs with an attorney.
The assistant flagged your question as high-risk and fact-specific. That's not a dead end — it's the responsible move. Matters like individual terminations, accommodation and interactive-process calls, harassment or retaliation investigations, layoffs, and wage-and-hour disputes with PAGA exposure turn on facts a general tool can't evaluate, and getting them wrong is costly in every state we cover — and in California especially.
How to find qualified employment counsel in your state
- Start with your state bar's certified lawyer-referral service. Every state we cover runs one, and certification means the panel is vetted rather than paid placement. In California that is the State Bar of California's referral service ↗; in Nevada, Texas, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Utah and Florida, search for your state bar by name and look for “lawyer referral.”
- Ask for an attorney who practices employment law on the management/employer side in your county — employee-side and employer-side practices are different specialisms, and you want the one that defends the decision you are about to make.
- Bring the assistant's answer with you — the controlling rule, sources, and assumptions give counsel a fast, factual starting point.
General HR information, not legal advice. Using this tool creates no attorney–client relationship, and conversations here are not privileged.