Judge to Approve Uber Overtime Class Action Settlement

A California judge said she will sign off on an Uber overtime class action settlement for 432 Uber “ambassadors” who claim they were not paid for overtime and breaks while recruiting drivers.

Judge Ann I. Jones explained she is asking for “little tweaks” to the deal, but conditionally approved the $466,000 settlement agreement.

Lead plaintiff Ellyn Kramer filed the suit against Uber Technologies in July 2015 and added plaintiff Wasehun Kidane within two months.

The Uber recruiters stated they was not given overtime, nor were they compensated for the time she spent picking up and returning promotional materials from Uber as Uber recruiters.

She was not paid for regularly provided breaks, nor was she reimbursed for mileage or for the work use of her own personal mobile phone.

As an Uber ambassador, Kramer was paid a fixed amount for each person she signed as an Uber driver, and a predetermined hourly rate was guaranteed.

Details of Uber Overtime Class Action Settlement

The wage and hour settlement will compensate 432 brand ambassadors who worked for the car-hailing company between July 31, 2011 and the date of this preliminary approval, July 6, 2016.

Each ambassador will be paid out of the settlement fund based on the amount of time they worked for the company. The agreement acknowledges most of the class members worked part-time and one-third of them worked for Uber for fewer than four weeks.

Interestingly, the settlement amount includes $36,000 that was already paid to 36 class members who were seeking part of the Uber overtime class action settlement.

A preliminary approval motion filed by the plaintiffs states that Uber ended the ambassador program in the fall of 2015 and started to contact putative class members to settle the claims on an individual basis.

The rest of the settlement breaks down as $153,780 in attorneys’ fees; $10,000 for costs; $12,000 for the claims administrator; $5,000 each for Kramer and Kidane as class representatives; $13,600 to the California Labor Workforce Development Agency for penalties for the wage-hour violations under California’s Private Attorney General Act.

Despite its willingness to agree to the Uber overtime class action settlement, Uber denies any wrongdoing.

Uber Not New to Lawsuits

Uber Technologies started in 2009 and now operates in more than 300 cities around the world. Recently, Uber has faced several wage and hour lawsuits in the United States.

Last Thursday, a California federal judge ordered both Uber and its drivers to come forward with more information regarding a proposed $100 million settlement in two class action lawsuits that accuse Uber of misclassifying drivers as independent contractors.

Uber settled such a lawsuit in San Francisco earlier this year, an $84 million deal that also accused Uber of misclassifying drivers as independent contractors.

Surprisingly, the settlement does not change the employee classification, but it revamped policies regarding how drivers are deactivated from the service and how they are rated.

The named plaintiff in that case lashed out against his attorneys for agreeing to a settlement that did not change the independent contractor status of Uber drivers.

The Uber Overtime Class Action Lawsuit is Ellyn Kramer, et. al., v. Uber Technologies, Inc., et. al., Case No. BC589891 in the Superior Court of the State of California, County of Los Angeles.

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