18th Annual Workplace Class Action Report - 2022 Edition

Annual Workplace Class Action Litigation Report: 2022 Edition 151 Id . at *13-14. The Court noted that the declarations they submitted all shared similar allegations of fact based on the worker’s experience, including being required to work in excess of 40 hours per week without being paid overtime compensation. As to the Rule 30(b)(6) depositions, the Court found that the evidence presented established that all workers were paid and treated the same. The Court thus ruled that Plaintiff was similarly- situated for purposes of conditional certification. As to the manageability of collective treatment, the Court concluded that the revised collective action description was manageable. Assuming 100% participation, the collective action consisted of 5,184 workers from 200 staffing agencies assigned to 2 customers in a single industry. Id . at *19. For these reasons, the Court found that the case was manageable as a collective action, and it granted Plaintiff’s motion. Snider, et al. v. Quantum Health, Inc., 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 18285 (S.D. Ohio Feb. 1, 2021). Plaintiff, a Utilization Review Employee ("URE"), filed a collective action alleging that Defendant misclassified URSs as exempt from overtime compensation in violation of the FLSA. Plaintiff filed a motion for conditional certification of a collective action, which the Court granted. Plaintiff alleged that while some UREs were nurses by degree or registration, their duties at Defendant did not entail providing traditional nursing or mental healthcare in a clinical setting, exercising clinical judgment, or providing direct care to individuals. Id . at *4. Plaintiffs asserted that UREs applied and communicated Defendant’s practices, procedures, guidelines, and criteria for the approval of insurance claims. Plaintiff further submitted that he and other UREs regularly worked over 40 hours per workweek but were not compensated for their overtime hours because UREs were misclassified as salaried, exempt employees. Plaintiff also contended that UREs had several different job titles, but all performed the same general job duties and were thus all similarly-situated. Defendant did not oppose conditional certification. Instead, it asked the Court to limit the collective action to non-supervisory UREs who worked at its Ohio location, as the two declarations Plaintiff offered in support of his motion only detailed knowledge and experience concerning the Ohio location. In undertaking an independent analysis of Plaintiff’s motion, the Court agreed and granted conditional certification to those who were employed within the past three years, as non-supervisory, salaried UREs, classified as exempt from overtime compensation, who performed utilization review work under the job titles of Utilization Review Nurse, Utilization Management Nurse, Pre-Certification Nurse, and Rapid Response Nurse, and other similar job titles whose job duties include performing utilization review work. Id . at *7. For these reasons, the Court granted Plaintiffs’ motion for conditional certification of a collective action. Stephenson, et al. v. Family Solutions Of Ohio, LLC, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 65421 (N.D. Ohio April 5, 2021). Plaintiffs, a group of Qualified Mental Health Specialists ("QMHSs"), filed a class and collective action alleging violations of the minimum wage and overtime provisions of the FLSA and the Ohio Fair Minimum Wage Amendment ("OFMWA"). The Court previously had granted conditional certification of a collective action as to all current and formers QMHSs over the previous three years. Plaintiffs subsequently sought class certification of the state law claims under the OFMWA pursuant to Rule 23, and the Court granted the motion. Plaintiffs alleged that they were required to travel between client locations and that they were not paid for this time. Additionally, Plaintiffs were required to enter client documentation into Defendant’s record base and were also not compensated for that time. As to the Rule 23 requirement, numerosity, the Court held that the class of over 150 QMHSs was sufficiently numerous. Plaintiffs argued that commonality was satisfied because all putative QMHS class members were required to travel and enter documentation into patient records every day and used the same billing sheets to record their time, and were subject to the same alleged illegal policies. Defendant contended that individual issues would defeat all common questions due to the differences in clients, supervisors, and work locations. However, the Court rejected Defendant’s argument. It found that all of the putative class members shared the same job title and were required, as part of their job duties, to travel and document client notes. The Court therefore opined that Plaintiffs met the commonality requirement. The Court also reasoned that Plaintiffs met the typicality requirement because their state law claims arose from the same practice as the claims of the putative QMHS class members, i.e., Defendant’s alleged policy of failing to pay QMHSs for time spent traveling, entering documentation, and dealing with no shows. Id . at *48. The Court also determined that Plaintiffs were adequate class representative as they had common interests with the putative class members and were actively involved in the litigation. Further, the Court reasoned that Plaintiffs’ counsel had vigorously pursued the claims in the action, and was adequate counsel for purposes of litigating a class action. As to the Rule 23(b) requirements, Plaintiffs contended that the predominance requirement was satisfied because the central factual and legal questions in this case were common to the putative class and likely to