Tag Archives: unpaid hours

DOL Makes FLSA Mistakes More Costly for Employers

On April 9, 2021, the U.S. Department of Labor’s (DOL) Wage and Hour Division (WHD)—the arm of the DOL responsible for enforcing the FLSA—officially rescinded a controversial employer-friendly enforcement practice implemented less than a year ago. As a general rule, the FLSA requires liquidated damages be assessed after finding an employer violated the Act’s minimum wage or overtime requirements. Liquidated ...

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Alabama Fire Inspectors File FLSA Overtime and Retaliation Lawsuit

The City of Selma, Alabama is the latest city facing an FLSA lawsuit filed by city firefighters. Three Assistant Fire Marshals/Fire Inspectors filed the suit, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Alabama, on April 19, 2021. Richard C. Byrd, Willie J. Mason Jr., and Aeneas L. Pettway allege that the city failed to pay them overtime ...

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Settlement Reached in Indiana FLSA Retaliation Lawsuit

The City of Tipton, Indiana has reached a a settlement with a veteran firefighter following an FLSA overtime and retaliation lawsuit. The Tipton City Council unanimously approved a maximum settlement of $18,763.42 to resolve a lawsuit filed last fall by veteran city firefighter Chad Frazier. Firefighter Frazier brought the lawsuit in September of 2020, alleging the city failed to pay ...

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TX Firefighters Frustrated with Payroll Problems Months After Cyber-Attack Consider FLSA Suit

The City of Texarkana, Texas is struggling to rebuild its internal payroll functions following a December 2020 cyber-attack. The attack, which corrupted and destroyed payroll data maintained by the city’s finance and human resource departments was initially discovered on December 6, 2020. In response to the breach, the city continued to pay impacted employees based on the last known accurate ...

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NC Paramedic Files FLSA Overtime Lawsuit Against County

A Wake County, North Carolina paramedic has filed a federal lawsuit alleging the county’s time tracking system fails to pay paramedics overtime as required by the FLSA. Paramedic Steven Gorrell filed this lawsuit, on behalf of himself and other similarly situated individuals, in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina on March 16, 2021. [As a ...

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The City of Lawrence, KS agrees to pay almost $1 Million in back OT to several dozen police sergeants, fire captains, and other city employees following FLSA review

The City of Lawrence, Kansas has voluntarily agreed to pay $998,600 to 24 police sergeants, 21 fire captains, and 3 other city employees following a recent FLSA review. The review, which was requested by a group of fire captains in 2019, found that the city improperly classified numerous city employees as overtime exempt. As a result of the city’s misclassification ...

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Cobb County Settles FLSA Suit with Fire Captain

Fire Captain David Simister and Cobb County, Georgia have agreed to a $30,000 settlement to end a lawsuit Simister filed in August 2020. Simister’s lawsuit, which was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia on August 13, 2020, contained allegations the county failed to pay overtime as required by the FLSA and that the county ...

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Maryland Fire Investigators and County Settle FLSA Lawsuit

A group of fire investigators from the Prince George’s County Fire Department have settled an overtime lawsuit they filed last summer. The lawsuit, which was filed in federal court on June 18, 2020, on behalf of fourteen county fire investigators, alleged the county’s pay practices violated the FLSA. Specifically, the investigators claimed the county improperly classified them as §207(k) firefighters. ...

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City Policy May Prove A Violation of the FLSA

Today’s FLSA Question: I am a newly appointed firefighter in a small municipal fire department. We work a 48/96 schedule and are paid every two weeks. The city has an old policy related to payroll that I do not think is FLSA compliant. If a firefighter misses any worktime during the two-week work period, they lose their FLSA overtime. Recently, ...

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