18th Annual Workplace Class Action Report - 2022 Edition

Annual Workplace Class Action Litigation Report: 2022 Edition 131 Plaintiffs and proposed opt-in Plaintiffs, it would be premature to grant Plaintiffs’ motion for conditional certification of a collective action. Id . at *7. For these reasons, the Court denied Plaintiff’s motion for conditional certification of a collective action and ordered limited discovery. Young, et al. v. Energy Drilling Co., 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 76659 (S.D. Tex. March 31, 2021). Plaintiff, an oil rig employee, filed a collective action alleging that Defendant failed to include bonuses in the regular rate for pay for purposes of calculating overtime compensation in violation of the FLSA. Plaintiff filed a motion for conditional certification of a collective action, which the Court granted. In support of his motion, Plaintiff offered evidence that he worked for Defendant as a driller and floor hand from approximately September 2017 to February 2020, was paid by the hour, and received bonuses that were never included in the formula used to calculate his overtime compensation. Id . at *6. Plaintiff further alleged that all other hourly oilfield employees were paid bonuses in a predetermined amount, and that based on his conversations with former co-workers, he believed all hourly oilfield employees were paid these non-discretionary bonuses regardless of job position, duties performed, or locations worked. Plaintiff also offered the declaration of another floor hand who averred that he experienced the same bonus and overtime pay practices as Plaintiff. Plaintiff also presented evidence of Defendant’s company-wide Safety Incentive Program under which rig managers, drillers, derrickmen, motormen, floor men, and tool pushers were eligible for bonuses. Id . at *6-7. The Court determined that Plaintiff’s evidence was sufficient to make the requisite showing necessary to establish that Plaintiff was similarly-situated to the membership of the proposed collective action. For these reasons, the Court granted Plaintiffs’ motion for conditional certification of a collective action. (vi) Sixth Circuit Alleman, et al. v. LPS Services , 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 123875 (S.D. Ohio May 6, 2021). Plaintiff, an hourly non-exempt security officer, filed a collective action alleging that Defendant, a security provider, failed to pay overtime compensation in violation of the FLSA. Plaintiff filed a motion for conditional certification of a collective action, which the Court granted. Plaintiff contended that Defendant maintained a company-wide policy requiring workers to arrive at least 10 minutes early to allow for proper change of shift procedures with the security officer working the preceding shift ("Early Arrival Policy"). Id . at *2. Plaintiff asserted that Defendant only paid for scheduled shift time of 40 hours per week, but with the additional time required for shift changes, she and others similarly-situated were actually working over 40 hours per week without receiving overtime compensation. Defendant argued that Plaintiff failed to demonstrate that she was similarly-situated to the other potential opt-in Plaintiffs because she failed to identify a common policy or theory of an FLSA violation. In support of conditional certification, Plaintiff submitted her declaration stating she was subject to the Early Arrival Policy and that it was a company-wide policy. Id . at *6. Plaintiff also submitted sworn declarations from three other former employees of Defendant, all which contained statements averring that the employees were personally subjected to the Early Arrival Policy, were sometimes told to stay late, and that these early and late arrivals were caused by a company-wide policy. Id . at *7. The Court held that Plaintiff’s allegations and the declarations were sufficient to make the requisite showing that Plaintiff and other security guards were similarly-situated. The Court determined that Defendant’s arguments went to the merits of Plaintiff’s claims, which made them inappropriate to consider at the conditional certification stage. The Court therefore granted conditional certification to a collective action consisting of all hourly, non-exempt employees of Defendant who were subjected to the Early Arrival Policy. Baughman, et al. v. KTH Parts Industries, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 153480 (S.D. Ohio Aug. 16, 2021). Plaintiffs, a group of hourly, non-exempt employees, filed a collective action alleging that Defendant 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 contended that they were only paid for hours they were scheduled to work, and not for time spent: (i) donning certain employer required personal protective equipment ("PPE") before they clocked-in for work; and (ii) work activities such as walking to their work stations, meeting their shift supervisors, setting up the work lines and/or attending group meetings after they clocked-in. Id . at *3. In support of their motion, Plaintiffs submitted timecards and the declaration of one of the named Plaintiffs, which averred that Defendant had a policy of "unlawful rounding" i.e. , not rounding to the "nearest quarter of an hour" as required and that Defendant improperly rounded “compensable time worked down when employees work more than 7 minutes after the scheduled end of their shifts." Id . at *4. The declaration also detailed the timekeeping system that all employees used to clock-in to their shifts and stated that based on other employees’ work