It looks like everybody has pretty well cover it. As a former Walmart employee, I would like to add that the health insurance was completely useless to me. The deductible for a single plan was $3,000 or $4,000. If you are working for Walmart wages, you can't afford to use it. I worked there for about 5 years all together and I don't like to miss work. The only benefit that benefited me was the 401k. If I would have had a serious health crisis, I would have been have been financially ruined rather than dead I suppose.
I only know of Walmart from the consumer's standpoint....which is to say from a grim position. It does seem as if all their employees are only there part time as the level of customer service is dismal. I once found a lawn mower I wished to buy but never could find anyone to sell it to me save for one person-who said they were in cosmetics and couldn't help-finally bought the same mower at Ace hardware for less than Walmart was charging. If you want to work some place to observe confusing to bad management, this is the place. Of the many people I know who patronize it, most say it's ONLY for the prices and, to me, that's not sufficient reason. However, from your standpoint, it's only part time and why should you care about the customers? So few who work there do. Just remember you can learn from negatives as well as positives....
I assume you are asking from the USA but I will answer from the uk side. Yes, it does because it is illegal in the UK to penalise part time workers by treating them differently to full time ones. One of the many advantages of workers rights.
Becoming a Gamestop Employee. Benefits?
Gamestop Employee Website
What does the term "yankee" mean, anyways?
as happy as the cow that jumped over the moon in that song; "High diddle diddle, The Cat and the Fiddle, The Cow jump'd over the Moon, The little dog laugh'd to see such Craft, And the Dish ran away with the Spoon"
Let's limit this to the big ticket items which is medical coverage. That's where the large costs lie. If a company has a group sponsored medical plan, that plan will have a guideline for hours worked to determine whether a part time employee is eligible for benefits. Some plan designs will allow a plan to go as low as 20 hours a week as an eligibility threshold. Once it is determined that a participant is eligible for benefits, standard operating procedure dictates that the eligible participant will receive the same treatment as any other benefits eligible employee. What this means is that if you have a part time employee that is benefits eligible, the cost of benefits when it comes to employer contributions on medical coverage will be the same as a full time employee. If the benchmark for eligibility on a company sponsored benefits plan is 25 hours a week, a part time employee working 26 hours a week will cost as much as a full time employee working 40. If a part time employee is below whatever threshold a company decides on to determine eligibility, then that person won't be able to get on a company plan. In that scenario the company cost would be nothing. So it depends.
Is it illegal for an employer to deny full-time benefits?
They didnt do anything illegal since they are not legally obligated to provide you with any of the benefits you're talking about and provide those services to their employees because that's THEIR policy, not the government's. However, they may be in some hot water for breaking their own handbook. However, I will point out that I don't see what you're going to get out of this by complaining. They would not be financially obligated to give you much except for paying you for any sick days or holidays you missed. But, to get that, you would have to sue them which would cost you your job obviously and I'm willing to bet their lawyers will be better than yours. So I'd just chalk this up as a life lesson in being more dilligent in ensuring that you're being properly compensated by your employer. Or, you could waste money on a lawsuit and lose your job over what is probably only a few thousand dollars, if that. EDIT: Then sue them, lose your job. Hopefully the few thousand dollars you possibly win will support you until you find your next job. That's after paying your lawyer of course.
Natural wax candles release negative ions when they burn. Pollen, dust, dirt, pollutants, and any other junk in the air all carry a positive charge, and that is how they can be suspended in the air. The negative ions released from burning a natural wax candle negate the positive charge of air contaminants, and the neutralized ions are sucked back into the burning candle or fall to the ground. Air purifiers and water filters also harness this effective negative ion technology.