Does Beverly Anns Cookie provide advice or guidance on employment-related decisions to franchisees?

You have sole responsibility and authority for all employment-related decisions, including employee selection, promotion, firing, hours worked, rates of pay, other benefits, work assignments, training and working conditions, compliance with wage and hour requirements, personnel policies, recordkeeping, supervision and discipline. We will not provide you with any advice or guidance on these matters. You must require your employees and independent contractors to review and sign any acknowledgment form we prescribe that explains the nature of the franchise relationship and notifies the employee or independent contractor that you are his or her sole employer. You agree that any direction you receive from us regarding employment/engagement policies should be considered as examples, that you alone are responsible for establishing and implementing your own policies, and that you understand that you should do so in consultation with local legal counsel competent in employment law. Your employees hired working for you will be your employees alone and will not, for any purpose, be deemed our employees or subject to our control, including with respect to any mandated or other insurance coverage, tax, or contributions, or requirements pertaining to withholdings, levied or fixed by any city, state, or federal governmental agency. You agree to inform each of your employees that you alone are the employer, and that we are not. You and we will file our own tax, regulatory, and payroll reports, and be responsible for all employee benefits and workers compensation payments with respect to our respective employees and operations, and we will save and indemnify one another of and from any liability of any nature whatsoever by virtue thereof.

Source: Item 23 — RECEIPTS (FDD pages 57–235)