New York Employment Attorneys Blog

MF Global Holdings Ltd., parent of the bankrupt broker-dealer MF Global Inc., is being sued after firing 1,066 employees last week. The suit was brought on behalf of former employees who are seeking 60 days' wages and benefits for allegedly being fired without cause.

The Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act requires employees to get 60 days advanced written notice of firing which, according to the filing in Manhattan bankruptcy court, they did not receive.

A spokesperson for Giddens, the trustee appointed to liquidate the broker-dealer, said that Giddens "acted appropriately in connection with the termination of employees as part of the court-mandated liquidation and wind-down of MF Global Inc."

MG Global Holdings, Ltd. filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy on October 31 after bets made on European sovereign debt did not pay off. The same day the Securities Investor Protection Corp sued MF Global Inc. to put it in liquidation (In re MF Global Inc., 11-ap-2790, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Southern District of New York).

Federal North Carolina Judge Malcolm J. Howard, granted a class certification and collective action for workers in Smithfield Packing Co. Inc. Workers allege that they were not paid for required activities performed either before, during or after their regular work shift.

Originally three separate plaintiffs brought suit against the bacon processing plant and U.S. Magistrate Judge Gates recommended that the cases had met the requisite elements to certify the plaintiffs for a class action. The class action would be open to all current and former hourly employees employed since 2007.

Workers allege that donning and doffing of protective gear and walking to their work stations both before and after their shifts and during lunch beaks were qualified job activities and should warrant compensation for the time spent doing these activities. The Plaintiffs state that they received no compensation as their compensation began when they were scheduled to start work, not when they commenced these required activities.

The Judge granted the class action certification because the employees eligible to opt into the suit only differed in locations where they worked and their start and end dates of employment.

Are you not being compensated for tasks required of your in your employment? Contact an attorney today.

When enacted, the Fair Labor Standards Act established minimum wage, overtime pay, recordkeeping, and youth employment standards affecting employees in the private sector and in Federal, State, and local governments. Overtime pay at a rate no less than one and one-half times an employee's regular rate of pay, is required after 40 hours of work per workweek. Currently, the federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour, but many states also have minimum wage that are higher.

Kinder Morgan and its subsidiary, Kinder Morgan Energy Partners LP, one of the largest pipeline transportation and energy companies in North America, just agreed to pay $830,422 in back wages to 4,659 current and former employees, resolving a lawsuit filed by the U.S. Department of Labor. The companies are also permanently enjoined from future violations of the FLSA.

The case was brought before the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas and a consent judgement has just been filed, but still requires judicial approval. The lawsuit came following an investigation led by the Houston District Office of the department's Wage and Hour divisions which found systemic FLSA violations at 11 Kinder Morgan locations in Arkansas, Colorado, Louisiana, North Dakota, and Texas.

U.S. Secretary of Labor Hilda L. Solis, said "the Labor Department will hold employers accountable when they do not properly pay their workers. The FLSA requires that hours be counted and overtime pay calculated accurately and in a transparent process. Today's settlement agreement provides back wages, but it will also help ensure that Kinder Morgan complies with the law in the future."

The New York State Department Of Labor is reporting that in 2010, nearly 26.6 million dollars was returned to workers for unpaid overtime and other wage violations, the second highest amount in the Department's history.

This record sum given back to workers is indicative of the current workplace, with employers trying to cut corners at the workers' expense, failing to pay legally required overtime, withholding wages or by illegally deducting money out of paychecks.
Last year, we saw a number of businesses failing to adhere to the law, many of which were in the service industry. Saigon Grill, a Manhattan restaurant chain, entered into a massive million-dollar settlement with delivery workers and restaurant staff. Dozens of other area restaurants were sued by employees claiming that they were not paid the proper minimum wage, or that the restaurants had often misappropriated tips meant for servers and not management.

New York State has thankfully taken steps to strengthen laws against wage theft by introducing the Wage Theft Prevention Act. The act, signed into law by outgoing Governor David Paterson, goes into effect on April 12, 2011 and will strengthen the rights of workers' against illegal deductions and paid overtime. The act creates significantly higher penalties for employers in the state, and increases the period in which an employer is liable. The act also requires employers to keep detailed records on tips and overtime accounting, further heightening employer accountability.

If your employer has failed to pay overtime, or has been withholding wages, contact us today to evaluate your rights.

A number of lawsuits against banking giant Bank Of America have been consolidated, paving the way for hundred of employees to move forward with their claims that the bank forced employees to unlawfully work unpaid overtime, among other claims.

The suit, filed in Kansas City, combines other lawsuits which have alleged that Bank Of America forced employees to work over 40 hours a week without proper overtime compensation. As well, employees were forced to work without meal breaks or rest periods, in violation of both state and federal statutes against it.

This suit could have potentially huge ramifications for the banking giant and its employees. We will continue to update this case as it progresses.

A number of former cooks and wait staff of New York City restaurant and bar B Bar have come forward to file a lawsuit against their employer, claiming that the restaurant did not follow standards for paying employees overtime.

The restaurant, owned by prominent restaurant and club owner Eric Goode, is a fixture for the hip New York set, frequently drawing celebrities. Goode, who owns a number of other restaurants including locations at the Maritime and Bowery hotels, is named as an individual defendant in this case.

This seems to be a particularly bad year for FLSA violations at restaurants in New York. Is this the work of a beefed up Department of Labor, with more investigators as promised by President Obama? Or are restaurant workers, who historically have worked for low wages and tips, starting to flex their legal rights as more and more suits hit? In either case, it is a promising sign for employees working the restaurant industry, and for the rights of hourly workers everywhere who are routinely denied overtime pay.

In a huge victory for Wal-Mart workers across Massachusetts, the retail giant has elected to settle a class action lawsuit brought by workers. The workers allege, among a list of violations, that Wal-Mart forced workers to work through breaks, did not pay workers overtime, and doctored pay cards to reduce workers salaries without their knowledge.

The settlement will amount to between 800 and 2000 for the workers affected, comprising a group of nearly 80,000 employees who worked at Wal-Mart's in Massachusetts between 1995 through 2005.

This settlement marks a victory for the workers of the company. Wal-Mart is no stranger to these sorts of cases, with a long history of taking advantage of their workers to drive down operating costs. Wal-Mart has long resisted paying their workers fair wages, and have broken up numerous efforts made by workers to organize themselves.

Wal-Mart and their dubious practices towards their employees have been in part thwarted this time. Part of the stipulation of settlement states that neither party comment on the matter further, not allowing for the parties to disclose exactly what happened to bring Wal-Mart to settle.

We here at the Harman Firm encourage any workers, especially those who are employed with Wal-Mart, to examine their practices towards workers before making buying decisions. Companies who repeatedly harass and take advantage of those who can afford it the least are not deserving of your money.

In a startling report issued in early September, the United States Department of Labor released the results of their inquiries into the use of child labor in manufacturing and other areas. The results are staggering- the report had found that child is used throughout the word to produced a number of products and goods.

According to the report, child labor is rampant in the harvesting of many agricultural products such as coffee, cotton, sugarcane and rubber, while "69 percent of child labor worldwide is in agriculture". This is a staggering proportion of children being forced to work to produce goods for our consumption.

Children are often put in much more precarious positions throughout the world, including being use to mine for gold in Burkina Faso and Peru. The report can be found here- . I encourage all of our readers to pay mind to this list and take into consideration the human costs of goods and products we so routinely ignore. While child labor may be legal abroad, we should do as much as we can do rally against such cruel practices and ensure rights for workers everywhere.

The United States Department of Labor released a report sometime last week detailing new efforts to ramp up enforcement of employers who have been violating laws protecting workers from wage and hour violations.

This comes as a welcome move as it seems to be more and more employers are partaking in this illegal practice, cheating workers everywhere out of money that is rightfully owed to them. In New York City alone, there has been dozens of reports in the previous months of nonpayment, failure to pay overtime, and failures to pay minimum wage.

The department of labor is hiring over 250 new investigators to process these claims of violations. This comes after interviews with nearly 4,000 workers resulted in the discovery of violations in almost every field in sector.

While this is good news for employees everywhere, it marks the beginning of the end of a long period of time where workers were routinely taken advantage of and cheated out of proper wages and rights. Hopefully, this will be a turning point in the battle against unfair labor practices and a victory for the rights of low income workers everywhere.

A new study released this week showed some troubling signs for low-income workers. The survey, whose results were published in the New York Times- Low Wage Workers Are Often Cheated, Study Says, found over a 1,000 workers making a median of 10 dollars an hour, found that these workers were extremely likely to have been taken advantage of by their employers. This included working off the clock, not getting proper time off for breaks and meals, as well as not being compensated or granted overtime. On average, this cost workers over 50 dollars from their take home pay, a net loss of around 15% of their total wages. As well, it found that these workers were often pressured unfairly to not take workers compensation when they would be injured on the job, denying them compensation and adequate time off to deal with these injuries sustained. It is terrible that these trends still persist, as laws to protect workers against these violations seem to go unheeded and under-enforced. States should work to inform workers more completely of their rights as employees, and ensure that this vulnerable group has protection against such abuses.

In a class action lawsuit filed in Federal Court this week, famed New York restaurant group Cipriani is under fire for allegedly underpaying workers, withholding wages, and failing to pay proper overtime to numerous workers. The lawsuit is another in the ongoing legal troubles for the group of restaurants, whose owner has not returned to New York for nearly 9 months while living abroad. Numerous other employees have come forward alleging underpayment of wages, and the group has also had trouble with the landlord of the Rainbow Room, where they have recently lost their lease.

This is also another staggering example of the out of control culture of corruption that exists in the New York dining world. It almost isn't even news anymore when a restaurant is found to have systematically taken advantage of its workers, and denying pay and overtime.

Maybe we should start a diner's hall of shame around New York City, alerting diners to the violations found at restaurants around the city and allow them to make decisions based on where workers are treated fairly.

Another week, another set of allegations of wage violations against
restaurants throughout New York City. This time around, 25 workers filed
a complaint against Wu Liang Ye, a group that operates two Chinese
restaurants in Midtown and the Upper East Side. The suit claims that
managers and owners had failed to pay workers for overtime, or even a
minimum wage, in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act. The suit also
alleges management drawing into tips that were meant for delivery staff
and busboys.

The amended complaint goes on to further allege that since the original
complaint was filed in February, management of Wu Liang Ye has retaliated
against workers for complaining and for trying to organize, and that some
employees who have complained have been fired.

This is just another example of management abusing and taking advantage of
employees; most of whom can least afford it. Workers should not have to
take such treatment, and we at the Harman Firm recommend that all workers
who believe have had their pay unfairly docked, or retaliated against come
forward to seek justice.

An interesting decision has been handed down in the 9th Circuit Appellate court out west. The ruling came in a case against the Castaway Casino and Resort Company. The suit alleges that the casino company failed to pay numerous workers during the companies decline into bankruptcy and reorganization. When the employees sued the trustees overseeing the bankruptcy operation, which included mostly company executives, the court found that they were liable along with the company. This ruling may have a widespread effect, as more and more workers are dealing with companies undergoing bankruptcy, with the major effect of letting workers sue the executives in civil courts rather than seeking damages in a bankruptcy court.

Another New York City restaurant has been cited for a variety of wage
violations, following close on the heels of dozens of other restaurants
who have violated Federal and State labor laws. A lawsuit filed by New
York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo alleges that Lemongrass Grill, a
chain of Thai restaurants in downtown Manhattan systematically failed to
pay workers a minimum wage, as well as failed to keep records of hours and
personnel.

An article in the New York Times states that delivery persons would make
as little as 25 dollars for a 10 to 12 hour shift, while kitchen staff
would make as little as 50 dollars for their shifts. This type of
treatment is not only illegal, but borders on the inhumane.

The Harman Firm urges people to boycott the growing list of
restaurants in New York City that prey on workers. The systematic process
of undermining workers' rights should not be tolerated, nor rewarded.

The FLSA's anti-retaliation provision prohibits "discharg[ing] ... any employee because such employee has filed any complaint...." 29 U.S.C. § 215(a)(3) (emphasis added).

In 1993, the Second Circuit held that the anti-retaliation provision in the FLSA prohibits employers from retaliating against employees for filing formal complaints, instituting a proceeding, or testifying about FLSA violations, but does not encompass verbal complaints made to a supervisor. Lambert v. Genesee Hospital, 10 F.3d 46, 55 (2d Cir.1993)) (citations omitted).

On June 29, 2009, in Kasten v. Saint-Gobain Plastics, the Seventh Circuit followed when it held that, "the natural understanding of the phrase 'file any complaint' requires the submission of some writing to an employer, court, or administrative body."