18th Annual Workplace Class Action Report - 2022 Edition

128 Annual Workplace Class Action Litigation Report: 2022 Edition treatment was not appropriate because it would have to prove that it paid a salary and that any deductions taken were permissible under the FLSA for each individual employee. The Court found that there were significant and highly individualized inquires as to each Plaintiff’s salary and any alleged impermissible deduction, job duties, responsibilities, disparate and factual employment settings, and particular exemptions. In addition to all these differences, the Court reasoned that opt-in Plaintiffs were also dissimilar as to their employment experiences and job duties. Therefore, the Court determined that Plaintiffs’ claims were highly fact-intensive and given the multiple exemptions that would be presented as to each individual opt-in Plaintiff, decertification was warranted. The Court therefore granted Defendant’s motion to decertify the collective action. Soto, et al. v. Marquez Construction & Maintenance, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 171040 (W.D. Tex. April 9, 2021). Plaintiffs, a group of rig welders, filed a collective action alleging that Defendants failed to pay overtime compensation in violation of the FLSA. Plaintiffs filed a motion for conditional certification of a collective action, which the Court granted. Plaintiffs alleged that Defendants paid rig welders a regular rate of $55 per hour, of which $35 was "welder pay" and the other $20 was "rig pay." Id. at *2-3. Defendants included only "welder pay" when calculating the Plaintiffs’ regular rate of pay from which their overtime was calculated. Id. at *3. Plaintiffs asserted that Defendant’s calculation method was improper under the FLSA. In support of their motion, Plaintiffs offered their own declarations, which outlined their job duties, and averred that they were all subject to the same job expectations and they all worked in the same geographic locations. The declarations also asserted that all rig welders were similarly-situated with regard to pay, and received an hourly pay split into welder pay and rig pay, and that overtime compensation was only paid on the welder pay portion. The Court found that Plaintiffs made the requisite showing necessary to demonstrate that they were similarly-situated for purposes of conditional certification. For these reasons, the Court granted Plaintiffs’ motion for conditional certification of a collective action. Sterling, et al. v. Greater Houston Transportation Co., 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 127196 (S.D. Tex. July 8, 2021). Plaintiff, a taxi driver, filed a collective action alleging that Defendant misclassified drivers as independent contractors and thereby failed to pay them overtime compensation in violation of the FLSA. Plaintiff filed a motion for conditional certification of a collective action, which the Court granted. Plaintiff sought conditional certification of a collective action consisting of “all current and former drivers of the METROLift program who were classified as independent contractors for at least one week during the three-year period prior to the date the Court authorizes notice to the present.” Id . at *2. In support of his motion, Plaintiff offered testimony from five witness depositions taken during the precertification discovery period that showed that Plaintiff and the proposed collective action members were similarly-situated. Defendant contended that the Court should deny conditional certification because it had not yet found that Defendant was the employer of the drivers. Defendant further argued that the deposition testimony showed that the drivers were not similarly-situated. The Court reasoned that Plaintiff had sufficiently demonstrated that the relevant threshold issues could be determined for all members of the proposed collective action. The Court opined that the testimony showed that the drivers in the METROLift program all performed the same duties, were paid under the same compensation arrangements, wore the same uniforms, followed the same policies and procedures, were subject to the same hiring requirements, completed the same training, were supervised in the same way, were subject to the same level of control, and were required to follow identical METROLift contracts. Id . at *6-7. Accordingly, the Court determined that Plaintiff demonstrated that he was similarly-situated to the members of the proposed collective action, and it granted the motion for conditional certification. Sterling, et al. v. Greater Houston Transportation Co., 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 133231 (S.D. Tex. July 14, 2021). Plaintiff, a driver in the METROLift program, filed a collective action alleging that Defendants misclassified drivers as independent contractors and thereby failed to pay them overtime compensation in violation of the FLSA. Plaintiff filed a motion for conditional certification of a collective action, which the Court granted. After discovery, Plaintiff and Defendant Yellow Cab stipulated that conditional certification was appropriate under the FLSA. Plaintiff contended that the five witness depositions showed that the potential collective action members were similarly-situated. Defendant Metro argued that the Court should deny conditional certification because the Court has not granted summary judgment as to whether Metro was the employer of the drivers, and because many of Plaintiff’s claims about similar working conditions were disputed between the parties. Id . at *3. The Court observed that the question at this stage of the litigation was not