Oracle agrees to $25M settlement to resolve discrimination class action

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Update:

• Oracle agreed to a $25 million settlement to end a discrimination class action lawsuit claiming the company paid female employees less than male employees.
• Both parties asked Judge  V. Raymond Swope in the Superior Court of California to preliminarily approve the settlement.
• Oracle has the right to rescind the settlement if more than 5% of the settlement class opts out. The company will have seven days to rescind after being notified of the opt-outs.
• After a full-day mediation session on Dec. 19, 2023, mediator Hunter Hughes proposed the settlement, and both parties accepted the proposal on Dec. 22, 2023.

(April 27, 2021)

A class action lawsuit representing more than 3,000 allegedly underpaid female Oracle employees in California will proceed after a judge tossed the tech company’s effort to dodge the pay bias claims Monday.  

California Superior Court Judge V. Raymond Swope rejected the Texas-based company’s bid to dismiss the discrimination class action, pointing out that Oracle failed to proffer its own employment records to support its argument that there was a non-gendered reason for the alleged pay bias between men and women at the company.  

“Oracle failed to carry its initial burden of producing evidence establishing that bona fide factors other than sex fully justify the entire wage disparity between plaintiffs and all men in the same job code as plaintiffs during the relevant period,” states the order issued Monday.  

Judge Swope also rejected the company’s argument that pay discrepancies between employees with the same job codes reflected their quality of work. 

“Plaintiffs have submitted substantial evidence from which a reasonable fact finder could conclude that defendant’s highly specific job codes — of which there are thousands — classify employees by the skill, responsibility and effort needed to do their job,” concluded the court order.  

A trio of female Oracle employees filed the pay bias class action lawsuit in 2017. The plaintiffs claimed the company underpaid women across all its operations in California.  

In addition to Monday’s win, the plaintiffs secured certification of a class of 4,100 Oracle employees in 2020. Under that order, the class action will represent women employed by Oracle in California starting June 13, 2013. The class includes those in information technology, product development, or support jobs, but excludes campus hires and managerial positions.  

“We are delighted to be one step closer to winning redress for our deserving class members and to stopping Oracle’s unfair pay practices,” a lawyer representing the plaintiffs told Law360 after the ruling, also noting a case management conference would be held by the court later this week.  

Are you an Oracle employee? What do you think about the Oracle pay discrimination class action settlement? Tell us in the comment section below.

The lead plaintiffs are represented by James Finberg, Eve H. Cervantez, Danielle E. Leonard and Connie K. Chan of Altshuler Berzon LLP and Erin Pulaski, John Mullan and William McElhinny of Rudy Exelrod Zieff & Lowe LLP. 

The Oracle pay bias class action lawsuit is Rong Jewett, et al. v. Oracle America Inc., Case No. 17-CIV-02669, in the Superior Court of the State of California for the County of San Mateo. 

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