Virginia employers are at increased risk of class action wage litigation following passage of the Virginia Overtime Wage Act.
“Previously, Virginia had been content to rely on the overtime pay requirements of the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA),” note Kristina H. Vaquera and Shaun M. Bennett in a recent Jackson Lewis legal alert…
The laws governing wages and hours of work affect nearly everyone—and have a significant affect on class and collective actions. How employees are paid, whether as hourly non-exempt, salaried-exempt, tipped, or commissioned sales workers, and how much they are paid, are questions of deep interest to employees and employers alike. And because the laws regulating…
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit has just issued an important decision addressing “how stringently, and how soon, district courts should enforce Section 216(b)’s ‘similarly situated’ mandate” when considering motions for certification of collective actions under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). The appeals court rejected the familiar two-step, conditional certification-followed-by-decertification approach…
As federal and state safety and health guidelines in response to the COVID-19 pandemic call for extensive use of personal protective equipment (PPE) in the workplace, employers should give their policies on “donning and doffing” a fresh look. Pandemic-related reopening orders issued by state and local governments may include requirements that will require employers to…
The U.S. Supreme Court has been asked to fill a gaping hole in our Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) jurisprudence: What, precisely, is meant by “similarly situated,” as set forth in 29 U.S.C. 216(b)? The request comes in a petition for certiorari of a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit…
In Weirbach v. Cellular Connection, LLC, a federal district court in Pennsylvania declined to conditionally certify a nationwide collective action under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) because it found it did not have personal jurisdiction over the claims of employees who lived and worked outside of Pennsylvania.
While district courts are sharply divided…
Consistent with the terms of the arbitration agreement at issue, an hourly fuel tech and driver is entitled to arbitrate collective claims alleging that his employer violated the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), the federal appeals court in New Orleans has ruled. Sun Coast Resources Inc. v. Roy Conrad, No. 19-20058 (5th Cir.
A Minnesota federal district court recently denied FLSA conditional certification over the claims of workers who were not assigned to a Minnesota project at issue or not Minnesota residents due to specific jurisdiction considerations. Vallone et al. v. The CJS Solutions Group, LLC, No. 19-1532 (D. Minn. Feb. 5, 2020).
The court based its decision…
The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals recently concluded that all officers of a private security and traffic control company were “employees,” rather than independent contractors under the Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”). The case is Acosta v. Off Duty Police Services, Inc., Nos. 17-5995 and 17-6071 (6th Cir. Feb. 12, 2019).
Off Duty Police …
The Wage and Hour Division of the Department of Labor (“DOL”) today rescinded Obama-era enforcement guidance that had made the tip credit unavailable to tipped employees who spend more than 20% of their time performing allegedly non-tip generating duties. The so-called “80/20” Rule has spawned a number of lawsuits, many of them collective actions, claiming…
