Remote, a platform that helps employers manage global workforces, launched a new compliance tool for managing contractors and freelancers on Jan. 24.

The tool, called Contractor Management Plus, is intended to safeguard employers from misclassifying workers, according to a press release from the company. It also automates onboarding and recordkeeping, while also allowing companies to pay contractors in their local currency.

Remote’s investment in the new product comes as a number of countries, including the US, are scrutinizing businesses’ use of independent contractors. The Department of Labor recently rescinded a Trump-era standard that had made it easier for companies to classify employees as independent contractors, a decision that could have implications for the gig economy, but is already being legally challenged.

As the gig economy grows and more employers look to hire workers abroad, the product is intended to help HR departments navigate labor regulations in different countries, said Pedro Barros, Remote’s SVP and GM of contractors.

Keep reading here.—CV

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Bank of America and Walmart recently announced they would provide certain employees with stock grants, a move to engender employee loyalty and strengthen retention in a still-tight labor market.

The goods. Bank of America will distribute $800 million worth of restricted stock across most of its workforce, according to a Jan. 25 memo reported on by Bloomberg and Reuters. Under the incentive, employees who earn as much as $500,000 a year will receive restricted stock on top of their regular compensation. Since the bank rolled out this program in 2017, it has distributed $4.8 billion in restricted stock, Bloomberg reported.

On Jan. 29, Walmart announced store managers will be eligible to receive company stock worth up to $20,000 a year. Coupled with a bonus of up to 200% of employees’ base salary that the company is now offering, “a successful manager of a large Walmart store can earn up to $404,000 a year in total compensation,” the Wall Street Journal reported.

The reason for the goods. Equity, a form of compensation that gives employees partial ownership of where they work, is seen by many HR leaders as a way to motivate employees and keep them engaged, HR Brew previously reported.

Keep reading here.—CV

Do you ever feel like you’re being watched?

For some Amazon warehouse workers in France, they were. The online retail giant was electronically tracking employees’ work, and now it might have to pay a hefty fine.

The Commission Nationale Informatique and Libertés (CNIL), the French agency that enforces data privacy laws in the country, fined Amazon subsidiary Amazon France Logistique €32 million (the equivalent of just under $35 million) for violating employee privacy, TechCrunch reported.

Employees at Amazon’s French warehouses use a barcode scanner to prepare customer orders and track incoming items. Amazon used the scanner data to track employee inactivity of more than 10 minutes, scanning errors (such as double-scanning items), and 1 to 10 minute breaks, the BBC reported.

Keep reading here.—KP

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Today’s top HR reads.

Stat: Financial firms cut 23,200 jobs in January, the most in more than five years. (CBS News)

Quote: “Juries who have heard the evidence should be able to push employers who knowingly or recklessly break the nation’s workplace civil rights laws without constraints from outdated caps on damages.”—Karla Gilbride, general counsel of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, on raising discrimination lawsuit caps (SHRM)

Read: Amid spiking childcare costs, more employers are offering daycare options to keep parents as employees. (Fortune)

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