Dive Brief:

• Quicken Loans Inc. violated federal labor law by interfering with its employees' rights to discuss unionizing and work conditions, according to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
• As reported by Bloomberg BNA, the court backed the NLRB's view that an employer, in this case Quicken Loans, violates the law by merely maintaining a rule employees "reasonably would view as coercive.
• Writing for the court, Judge Patricia A. Millett said the NLRB properly held that “sweeping” provisions in the mortgage company's confidentiality and non-disparagement policies were unlawful.

Dive Insight:

Quicken Loans argued that the NLRB lacked evidence employees were disciplined or that any were actually intimidated by the rules, but Judge Millett felt otherwise, writing that the NLRB "can act to block rules that might chill the exercise of employee rights in the future."

Millett said the company, which has about 1,700 employees, forced workers to sign an employment agreement that had two disputed provisions: One, the company's confidentiality rule prohibited employees from disclosing “personnel information” to any person “except as may be authorized by the Company in writing.” Employees were also required to accept a non-disparagement rule, which basically prohibited employees from speaking ill of the company.

Both ran afoul of the National Labor Relations Act's Section 7 rights of employees, the court ruled, and it "enforced the board's unfair labor practice decision" against Quicken Loans.