TSA Employees Not Getting Hazard Pay They Are Due, Class Action Lawsuit Claims

A new class action lawsuit filed against the United States government claims Transportation Security Administration (TSA) workers have not been getting the hazard pay the law calls for during the coronavirus pandemic.

The Code of Federal Regulations requires that federal workers receive a “hazardous duty pay differential for exposure to virulent biologicals” and that they get an “environmental differential for exposure to hazardous micro-organisms.” TSA employees including plaintiff Marion H. performs work that qualifies her for both types of additional compensation, but she’s not getting it, Marion claims.

A lead transportation security officer, Marion says she has been working with or in close proximity to objects, surfaces and people infected with COVID-19 – without sufficient protective devices. Specifically, she has had to screen and physically handle passengers and their belongings without any personal protective equipment provided by the agency, she claims.

That should at least qualify her to receive the 25% hazard pay designated for exposure to virulent biologicals and the 4-8% differential for hazardous microorganisms. She hasn’t gotten either, prompting her to file the class action lawsuit against the United States government in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims on Nov. 30.

She is seeking the court’s approval to represent all TSA employees who have been denied hazard pay during the coronavirus pandemic. It is unclear exactly how many workers might be eligible to participate in the class action lawsuit, but Marion’s lawyers say there are easily more than 1,000.

Once the World Health Organization declared the COVID-19 situation had become a pandemic on March 12, U.S. officials issued travel bans that blocked most flights from continental Europe to the United States. On March 16, domestic flights were also restricted. Still, a limited number of flights continued and as the months wore on, airline travel began to pick up again.

Though still nowhere near the normal, pre-pandemic volume, millions of passengers have moved through the nation’s airports in recent months – putting airport and airline workers at some risk.

Under the federal law, the “virulent biologicals” that warrant hazard pay are defined as “materials of micro-organic nature which when introduced into the body are likely to cause serious disease or fatality and for which protective devices do not afford complete protection.”

According to The USA Today, a minimum of 2,885 TSA employees have tested positive for COVID-19 as of Nov. 17 and nine of them have died.

“TSA employees are forced to work every day without appropriate protective equipment being provided and other safeguards being taken to reduce their exposure to COVID-19. And as evident from the number of deaths so far, the risk is not hypothetical,” the proposed class action lawsuit states. “It is very real.”

Even if the federal government provided TSA employees with ample personal protective equipment and took other steps to minimize the workers’ exposure to COVID-19 – which Marion repeatedly argues it has not – none of those measures could mitigate the risk below the threshold that qualifies the staff for hazard pay, the class action lawsuit claims.

Marion and her lawyers want the court to declare that the government should have been compensating the TSA employees with the hazard pay called for in the federal code and that it must now calculate what it owes those workers and pay them.

Have you been denied the kind of hazard pay the law says certain federal workers are entitled to during the coronavirus pandemic? Tell us about it in the comment section below.

Lead plaintiff and the proposed Class Members are represented by Michael Morrison of Alexander Morrison and Fehr and Kevin J. Cole of Parker Cole PC.

The TSA Employees Class Action Lawsuit is Marion H., et al. v. United States of America, Case No. 1:20-cv-01700-EJD, in the U.S. Court of Federal Claims.

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