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Bayada Overtime Lawsuit Overview:
- Who: Employees of Bayada Home Health Care are suing their employer in a newly-certified class action lawsuit.
- Why: The employees allege Bayada underpaid them for overtime work.
- Where: The lawsuit is being heard in federal court in New Jersey.
Employees of Bayada Home Health Care who allege that the company underpaid them overtime pay have had their class action lawsuit certified, allowing them pursue the recovery of their allegedly unpaid wages.
U.S. District Judge Noel Hillman certified the Fair Labor Standards Act lawsuit in New Jersey federal court saying that Bayada’s argument that the employees did not share the same experience was unconvincing, Law360 reports.
Bayada claimed that its uniform policies for client service managers were not enforced uniformly due to different duties being performed at different locations under different managers was not convincing, but Hillman rejected that.
“While the existence of uniform policies is not dispositive, it is strong evidence to support plaintiffs’ burden of showing how they are similarly situated,” Hillman ruled.
The class action lawsuit was first filed in March 2017 by two client service managers who worked more than 40 hours per week, and said that between 70 and 95 percent of their work went towards nonexempt duties – and they sought to represent others in the same position.
According to the class action lawsuit, all Bayada’s client service managers were paid through salary and classified as exempt employees, regardless of whether they worked in home care or in a healthcare facility, Law360 reports.
The client service managers argued that the fact they worked under the same policies performing the same tasks defined by the same job descriptions made them eligible for a class action lawsuit.
“The overwhelming evidence — from corporate documents and corporate admissions, to seven plaintiffs’ depositions — shows that those CSMs who joined this lawsuit spend most of their time performing substantially similar, non-exempt tasks,” the employees said, while seeking certification of the lawsuit.
Bayada, however, said that each client service manager was subject to different employment conditions depending on where and under whom they worked. The company argued that there was enough difference in the employees’ roles to make them ineligible for a class action lawsuit, adding that its “playbook” for the role was not evidence all employees were treated the same, Law360 reports.
“The playbook is there to provide guidelines, but Bayada does not expect its offices to perform and evaluate all activities outlined in the playbook because of all the varying factors that differentiate each office,” Bayada said.
Have you ever been underpaid for overtime work? Let us know your experience in the comments section!
The client service managers are represented by Michael John Palitz, Gregg I. Shavitz and Alan L. Quiles of Shavitz Law Group PA.
Bayada Home Health Care is represented by Michael Homans of Homans Peck LLC.
The Bayada CSM Overtime Class Action Lawsuit is Ivanovs et al. v. Bayada Home Health Care Inc., Case No. 1:17-cv-01742, in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey
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