What gets a lot of employers into trouble is the failure to keep accurate records. Or worse, the actual falsification of records or knowingly keeping and maintaining inaccurate records. Nothing will cause the DOL to come down harder on an employer and for the courts to back up the agency. A recent example of this
Labor Contract Preemption Defense Cannot Kill Wage Suit Because No Interpretation of Contract Required
I have often blogged about the need for defense lawyers to look for a labor law preemption defense when a wage hour action, single or FLSA collective action is lodged. If the preemption argument succeeds, it is a magic bullet that makes the case totally go away. There has to be, however, some direct connection
Flushed Down the Toilet: Porta Potty Company Settles FLSA Overtime Collective Action
Employers often do not like to pay overtime, although they must, and they sometimes come up with creative arrangements not to do so. That is fine, until an employee, often one who has been fired, files a lawsuit. Then, the company must resolve the lawsuit and fix the “problem” going forward. A recent example of
Flimsy Affidavit From Named Plaintiff Insufficient to Secure Conditional Certification in FLSA Collective Action: A Case for Sanity!
It seems that plaintiffs (and their lawyers) think that all they have to do to get conditional certification is throw up a flimsy Affidavit from the named plaintiff and the Court will hand them conditional certification, like it is giving out candy. Fortunately, in the District of New Jersey that is not the case, as
FLSA Collective Action Defeated in One Fell Swoop by Exemption Defense: Way to Go!
I love it when the employer wins an exemption case because the deck is so often stacked against the employer on these kinds of cases. This is especially so when the action is a collective one under the FLSA. In this instance, a RN who was employed as a health insurance claims consultant was found
USDOL Opinion Letter on Bonuses Shows the New Vitality of This Important Instructional Tool
The USDOL is busy again issuing Opinion Letters and has again turned its focus to the issue of inclusion/exclusion of bonuses into the regular rate for purposes of overtime computation. These Letters are not binding on courts but they operate to evidence the agency’s position on whatever issue is being addressed so they are extremely
Fluctuating Work Week Calculation of Back Due Overtime Not Allowed by Pennsylvania Supreme Court
I have long been a fan of the fluctuating work week (FWW) method of paying overtime to non-exempt salaried employees. This computation yields a half-time calculation, i.e. a lower calculation than dividing the salary by forty and then calculating time and one half of that number. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court has recently held that this
Another Assistant Manager FLSA Class Action Goes Down—When Will They Ever Learn?
I love Assistant Manager class actions because it gives a defense lawyer a “golden” opportunity to defeat class certification by asserting that too much individual scrutiny is required to allow a class action to proceed. A beautiful example of this is a recent Walmart case where a group of Assistant Managers dropped their misclassification lawsuits,
USDOL Raking It in for Underpaid Employees: Is This the Promised Positive Change Towards Business?
There has been a lot of talk about how much more pro-business the U.S. Department of Labor was going to be under this Administration. Well, appearances can be deceiving, as a report has just come out indicating that the agency collected in excess of $322 million last year for workers who did not receive proper
Nationwide FLSA Class Action Fails Because Out-of-State Plaintiffs Are Not Sufficiently Connected to State Where Lawsuit Filed: A New Defendant Strategy Pays Off!
Many times, plaintiff lawyers will try to file FLSA class actions as nationwide lawsuits so the size of the class and potential recovery can be magnified geometrically. Well, that just got a little harder to do as a federal judge rejected an attempt by a group of Outback Steakhouse front-of-house managers to continue as a