Due to a payroll processing error, a bus monitor in Nashville, TN, quit her job yet still received a paycheck for an additional eight weeks.

When asked how it could happen, a spokeswoman for the school district simply said, “It didn’t get communicated to the person in payroll.”

Eventually, someone noticed the error, MSNBC reports. No word on how much money was paid, or if the district will try to recover it.

The worst part: School officials say the district may need to cut up to $15 million from next year’s budget. So, like at most employers these days, every penny counts.

This news comes less than a week after it was a reported a bus driver in the district was caught stealing more than $9,000 worth of gas for her personal car.

Can an employer require its employees to be clean shaven if workers wear facial hair for religious reasons? The situation gets even more complicated when workplace safety is involved.

A federal court has ruled the District of Columbia can’t force its firefighters to be clean shaven.

The court ruled firefighters who wear beards for religious reasons are exempt from the District’s no-beards policy under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.

The court said the District failed to prove its argument that beards stand in the way of good respirator fits. Firefighters use respirators to breathe when fires create a lack of oxygen.

The issue surrounds the firefighters’ use of self-contained breathing apparatuses (SCBAs).

There are two types: Those with positive pressure have been shown to protect against any leakage that might be caused by facial hair.

However, questions remain about leakage with negative-pressure SCBAs.

The court ruled the District didn’t show why firefighters with beards could not be redeployed elsewhere when negative-pressure respirators were required.

As it stands now, the ruling is the opposite of what’s required by OSHA: “The [respirator fit] test shall not be conducted if there is any hair growth between the skin and the facepiece sealing surface, such as stubble beard growth, beard, mustache or sideburns which cross the respirator sealing surface.”

However, OSHA regulations don’t cover public employees.

Cite: Potter v. District of Columbia, U.S. Court of Appeals, DC Circuit, No. 07-7163, 3/6/09.

First it was the caretaker job for a tropical Australian island.

Now, AirAsia is asking for entries from people who want to be a pilot — no experience required.

The Malaysian airline’s Web site makes it seem easy: “So YOU wanna be a pilot? Simple. What do you have to do? Blog. What? That’s it? Yes, you’re reading it right. Blog.”

The airline will select 10 finalists who will take part in the first round of new pilot intake.

The contest starts April 1. Hm. Has anyone noticed that’s April Fools’ Day?

Henry Velez suffered from a rare medical condition that made him unable to sweat. Despite that problem, he worked in manual labor for most of his life. He had one work restriction: He needed to take breaks to cool down.

While working for Agro Distribution, he spent about two years without any problems — his manager allowed him to take breaks as needed.

Then every employee in Velez’s position was assigned a new duty — the unpleasant task of unloading dirty, empty barrels that had been used to feed cattle. Velez told his boss his condition prevented him from helping.

The manager wouldn’t hear of it — after all, he’d been performing similar work for two years. What was different now?

Velez filed a complaint with the EEOC, alleging the company violated the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). The agency thought he had a case.

However, the EEOC handled the matter in a way that was less than objective, according to the company. When an investigator came to the facility, she insulted managers, scoffed at their answers to questions and attempted to rephrase their statements to favor Velez.

Afterward, the company claimed it tried to contact the EEOC to offer a settlement, but the agency never responded.

Eventually, the issue ended up in court. The judge agreed with the company that Velez wasn’t protected by the ADA. And, the court ruled, the EEOC “failed to conciliate in good faith.”

The final decision: The case was tossed, and the EEOC was forced to pay Agro’s legal fees.

Cite: EEOC v. Agro Distribution LLC.

We can all probably agree on this: Criticizing your employer on the Web is a stupid thing to do. But what should the punishment be?

Dan Leone was the west gate chief on game days at the Philadelphia Eagles’ Lincoln Financial Field. He worked on game days for the Eagles for six years.

Recently, he became upset at the Eagles’ decision to let longtime Safety Brian Dawkins sign with the Denver Broncos.

Leone expressed his frustration with Dawkins’ departure by posting this on his Facebook page: “Dan is [expletive] devastated about Dawkins signing with Denver … Dam Eagles R Retarted!!” (We haven’t corrected any spelling in the post.)

Leone regretted his post soon after making it and took it down.

Less than two days after posting his remarks, Leone says he was contacted by the team’s director of event operations, Leonard Bonacci, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer. Leone says Bonacci told him they had to talk about the Facebook post.

Two days later, Leone says, he received a call from the team’s guest services manager, Rachel Vitagliano, who fired him over the phone in a call that lasted less than 10 minutes. Leone says he never heard back from Bonacci.

Leone says he was ready to apologize, and did so when he got the call that he was fired. He says Vitagliano didn’t want to hear it and told him he couldn’t be trusted, the post made the team look bad and the only option was to fire him.

As you might imagine, Leone’s story has become a célèbre. The article in the Inquirer notes that he grew up in the shadow of the Eagles’ old Veterans Stadium and that he has a neurological disorder called transverse myelitis. The disorder requires him to do his job at the stadium sometimes in a wheelchair.

The title of the article is a rallying cry: Cold Eagles sure are thin-skinned. It suggests the Eagles could have handled the situation with a warning, a suspension and that Leone deserved a face-to-face meeting even though he was a part-time employee.

Leone says, “If they called me right now and told me to come back to work, I would. I’m not holding any grudges. I just want to do my job.”

So, what do you think? Was the firing too harsh? What about the way it was allegedly handled? (The Eagles won’t comment.) Is a suspension with a warning a better way to handle this situation? Does it depend on exactly what’s said in an employee’s Web post? How would you handle an employee’s Web post critical of your company?

Let us know what you think in the Comments Box below.

The man who inspired the character Sam Malone on TV’s Cheers has been laid off from his bar tending job in Boston.

Eddie Doyle tended bar for 35 years at the pub known as the Bull & Finch.

The bar’s owner says the economy is to blame.

After Cheers debuted on NBC in 1982, he started serving 5,000 customers a day.

Doyle tells The Boston Globe that he’s not bitter and he might write a book about his experiences.

A hearing officer has ruled that a city of Denver employee should get to keep his job after failing a Breathalyzer test because the printer hooked to the machine failed to produce a printed record of the test.

John Delgado is an equipment-operator specialist — certainly a safety-sensitive job.

On July 27, 2007, Delgado failed a random drug test given to such employees and tested positive for cocaine, according to The Denver Post.

By agreeing to abstain from alcohol and illegal drugs for three years and seeking treatment, he was able to keep his job.

On Sept. 18, 2008, while operating a road patcher, a follow-up alcohol test showed he had a 0.06% blood-alcohol content.

But, the hearing officer ruled Delgado should get to keep his job because the printer attached to the Breathalyzer malfunctioned and no printout of the test was available.

The state requires a printout of results. Since the city didn’t have one, it failed to prove a violation, according to the hearing officer.

Delgado didn’t dispute the Breathalyzer test results. Despite that, the ruling said he should be reinstated and have any pay or benefits that had been withheld from him restored.

The City of Denver plans to appeal the ruling.

As for the malfunctioning printer: It’s been fixed and a backup system has been installed.

Should Delgado get to keep his job? Let us know what you think in the Comments Box below.

How many times have you had to change your company’s dress code to address situations that no one previously thought of? Next question: Does your company’s dress code cover hats?

The borough of Littlestown, PA, recently told a school crossing guard he could no longer where his signature silly hats on the job because they were unprofessional and a distraction to drivers. They told him to wear his standard-issue crossing guard hat instead.

Children called Larry Douthwaite “Hat Man.” His collection includes a 2-foot-tall stovepipe hat, a pharaoh-style covering and one that looks like he has a jet airplane sitting on top of his head.

Douthwaite told WGAL-TV that he wore the hats for the kids at first. But then he noticed the hats helped him be safe because people were more likely to notice him.

After he started wearing his crossing guard hat every day, it didn’t take long for people in the community to notice that his funny hats were gone.

People wanted Douthwaite’s fun hats back. Public support for him was huge. WGAL ran a survey, and 96% said he should be able to wear the fun hats.

“I think they are tired of having fun things sucked out of their life, and I think the reaction mushroomed because of that,” said Douthwaite.

Happy ending

When citizens speak up in one voice about an issue, politicians often listen.

The Littlestown Borough Council voted unanimously to allow Douthwaite to continue wearing his hats.

How did Douthwaite celebrate his victory? By wearing his pharaoh hat on the job the day after the borough council vote.

So, here are some questions regarding this story:

• Should Douthwaite be allowed to wear the silly hats? Do you think they’d be a help or hindrance for a school crossing guard?
• Have you ever had a special dress-up day at work to help improve morale? Maybe Hawaiian shirt day?
• In these tough economic times, should HR allow some rules, such as dress code, to be bent a little bit if it’ll improve morale?

Let us know your thoughts via the Comments Box below.

A spokesman for the CGIL steelworkers’ branch in Bergamo, Italy, said the woman — a long-term employee — was fired from a metalworking shop for “singing and bothering her colleagues,” according to a report by Agence France-Presse.

The union spokesman claims the stated reason for her firing is ridiculous because her job was hammering metal, and no one in the workplace would be able to hear her more than a couple of yards away.

He says the her singing was a pretext that the employer used to fire a worker during hard economic times.

Barbara Emme worked 31 years for supermarket chain Kaisers in Berlin. She denies an accusation by her former employer that she kept bottle deposit receipts worth $1.65.

A court recently upheld the decision to fire her. Now, leaders of Germany’s major political parties are criticizing the decisions by Kaisers and the court.

“I don’t understand how a cashier can be fired because of 1.30 euros while managers who lose billions of euros can keep their jobs,” said Horst Seehofer, leader of the Christian Social Union party.

Barbara the Cashier says her phone has been ringing off the hook since news of her firing hit German media.

Unfortunately, she says she hasn’t received an offer of a new job.