Articles Posted in wage and hour lawsuit

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Anyone who has ever worked in the restaurant service industry is familiar with the term, “side work.” It’s the work that servers are often required to do on top of the normal serving of tables. What many workers may not know is that payment for these duties must be at least the minimum wage. The federal minimum wage is currently set at $7.25. server

A recent wage and hour lawsuit in North Carolina highlights this problem.

A former server at a restaurant chain alleges the company paid her – and hundreds of other workers – just $2.13 an hour (typical for waiters and waitresses), even while requiring her to do side work for which she should have received minimum wage.  Continue Reading ›

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Anyone who has worked in the service industry for any amount of time knows that wage theft is rampant in the restaurant business. But allegedly, national pizza chain Domino’s baked a rigged system right into their payroll software. pizza

The New York Attorney General’s office has filed a lawsuit against Domino’s – both the parent company and the franchise, as joint employers – for systematically cheating workers out of money they were owed. The lawsuit follows a years-long investigation that produced a digital paper trail from each franchised pizza shop straight to the corporate headquarters.

The wage theft lawsuit, which names three franchises plus the corporate parent company, alleges workers were underpaid at least $565,000 at 10 stores throughout New York. This case marks the first time that the attorney general in New York has asserted a fast food corporation is liable as a joint employer for labor violations that occur at franchises. It’s a closely watched case because it could mean greater accountability throughout the industry if the attorney general prevails.  Continue Reading ›

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In the State of California, being a domestic worker or home healthcare worker is not an easy job.  These employees have not traditionally been fairly compensated, and there are a variety or reasons for this.  One of the reasons is that many domestic workers are women, and, as we all know, there is a long history of women women not being paid the same amount as their male counterparts for doing the exact same work.

bloodpressure1Another of the problems faced by domestic workers is that they are not protected by the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), which requires employers to pay their workers time and a half after they have worked eight hours in a day or 40 hours in a workweek.  One of the ways to help these domestic workers get around the exemptions in the FSLA is that the legislature in California passed what is known as the Domestic Workers Bill of Rights (AB 241) according to Women’s News.  Continue Reading ›

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In some gas station markets, you can go to the counter where fresh sandwiches and other food is prepared and use a computer screen to place your order.  You can decide what you want on it, what you want with it, and pay for your order at the kiosk.  You are then given a printed ticket to show to the workers making your order at the food counter.

burgersAccording to Wendy’s, the well known fast food chain , responded to recent decisions by lawmakers in California and New York to raise their respective minimum wages for workers to $15 per hour is causing the restaurant chain to replace actual employees with electronic kiosks that allow customers to place and pay for their orders.  Continue Reading ›

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There are many full service car washes in Los Angeles and Orange County, California.  For many years, these workers would put in a full day of hard work at leave with less than $50 paid in cash.  There was no fixed schedule, according to a recent news article from Truthout. Workers would often wait around for hours until cars arrived and then were told to begin work.  They were not being paid anything for those hours they were forced to stand around. If they failed to wait there, they would not get any work that day.

carwash-1514403Car wash employees said there was no accountability and nothing that could be done to make their respective employers follow the labor code in California.  If they complained, they would simply be fired – an illegal and retaliatory action – and would be replaced with someone else.  One of the reasons they were able to do this was because they largely hired Hispanic workers who may not speak English and are often reluctant to go to the authorities for fear of retaliation from the employer and loss of wages in general.  Continue Reading ›

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Many people who stay in hotels, even very expensive luxury hotels, will leave all kinds of trash for housekeepers to deal with.  According to a recent news article from NBC Los Angeles, this often includes medical waste that must be specially handled and safely disposed of in an approved receptacle.

syringe-1535962While the hotel chains are required to show a safety video to housekeepers and other hotel staff, according to a complaint filed by the employees of one high-end hotel in Beverley Hills, many workers claim they are not provided with the waste disposal equipment and other safety equipment featured in the worker safety video.  In other words, their employer is telling them they are aware of the problem, want employees to know there is a hazard and the safe way to handle medical waste, but allegedly does not want to spend the money providing workers with the necessary tools to complete this task. Continue Reading ›

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Chicken doesn’t come cheap. Or at least, not for the workers who toil to process it for the masses. chicken

A new report by Oxfam America asserts workers in U.S. poultry processing plants risk high rates of injury, illness, difficult working conditions and unsympathetic bosses. But perhaps the worst offense, the one that is the greatest assault on their dignity as human beings: Lack of access to adequate restroom breaks.

This takes a toll on all workers, but women especially. Routinely, the workers say they are denied requests to use the restroom. Supervisors not only deny or ignore their requests, they mock them for it. They threaten punishment. In some cases, they threaten to fire them. Workers told researchers it was not uncommon for them to wait up to an hour or more after making the request. Even when acquiesced, the supervisors usually set a time frame in which they must return.

Horrifyingly, workers say they are forced to wear diapers that allow them to urinate and defecate where they stand on the assembly line. They reduce the amount of liquids they drink – sometimes to a dangerous degree – so they won’t risk needing to use the restroom at work. They endure pain and discomfort and worse, serious health problems as a result of these violations of basic human rights.  Continue Reading ›

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According to a recent news release from the Voice of OC, two former employees at the Orange County Assessor’s Office have filed a lawsuit claiming wrongful termination and various other allegations of violations of the California labor code.

gavel7While there was some hope that the case would be settled prior to trial, it now appears that it will likely be heard before an Orange County jury, as the trial is scheduled to start in October of this year. Continue Reading ›

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When most people hear the term “contractor” they immediately think of a person you can hire to do work on your home.  You may be adding and extra room, building a garage, finishing a basement, or having many other types of work performed on the house.

visions-from-im-5-64561-mFor example, if you wanted to turn an unfinished basement into a guest apartment, you would have a contractor come over and prepare and estimate, and then you would hire this person to do the work.  He or she would tell you how long the job would take and what it would cost.  He or she would tell when you should stay out of the home to avoid any disruption and when the work would begin. Continue Reading ›

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According to a recent news feature from the Los Angeles Times, 4,200 jobs have been added to the economy in California. At the same time, we are experiencing the lowest unemployment rate in nearly the past decade. The current unemployment rate in the State of California is 5.4 percent.

job-concept-1445172-4-mIt should be noted that even at 5.4 percent, which is the best we have seen in California since 2007, these figures are still above the national average of 5 percent, but with the number continuing to fall each month (last month was 5.5 percent), the state may be closer to the national average if current trends continue, and for an economy the size of this state, that is a major accomplishment. Continue Reading ›

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