McDonald’s Workers Move for Class Cert. in Rest Break Class Action Lawsuit

A group of employees has filed a motion in California federal court asking the judge to issue Class certification to a group of more than 1,200 workers who allege that McDonald’s didn’t pay employees their proper wages and denied them rest breaks.

The current motion filed by the McDonald’s employees seeks to certify a Class of workers from the San Francisco Bay area who are employed at eight different locations in the Northern California area.

The McDonald’s rest break class action lawsuit seeks to include employees who worked at these eight locations since March 12, 2010.

The original lawsuit was filed in 2014, where workers named as defendants McDonald’s Corp. and the owner of the franchise, Bobby O. Haynes Sr. and Carol R. Haynes Family Limited Partnership.

Rest Break Class Action Lawsuit Still Seeks Certification

The employees and the Haynes company have already reached a settlement, which they will submit to the court for preliminary approval, according to the motion.

However, the workers are still seeking Class certification against McDonald’s, stating that approximately 1,200 employees share enough common issues in their work experiences to be able to argue their claims as a Class.

“Crewmembers at the Haynes-operated McDonald’s restaurants share the common experience of having their application process, orientation, training, daily work environment, and responsibilities determined by McDonald’s-approved policies, forms, and products,” the motion for certification states.

The recent motion and the rest break class action lawsuit also seek to name three plaintiffs as class representatives – plaintiffs Guadalupe Salazar, Genoveva Lopez and Judith Zarate.

It also seeks to name Altshuler Berzon LLP and Cohen Millstein Sellers & Toll PLLC as Class counsel.

The McDonald’s workers accuse their employers of improperly calculating their wages and shorting their pay by using a payroll provider, as well as violating California law by not reimbursing employees for the money and time taken to maintain their work uniforms.

The workers have also brought forth overtime claims. One claim states that McDonald’s payroll system under-pays for overtime due to its preprogrammed settings.

The other claims states that overtime was only paid to employees working over nine hours per day or greater than 50 hours per week, rather than eight hours a day or 40 hours as required by law.

The McDonald’s rest break class action lawsuit also brings forth three claims of violating laws surrounding meals and rest breaks.

One claim asserts that workers were prohibited from leaving their place of business during meal breaks.

The second claim says that when breaks were offered, they were offered at inappropriate times, such as right before the end of a shift. The third claim says workers were shorted meal and rest breaks altogether.

McDonald’s has continued to assert that Haynes was responsible for hiring workers, issuing assignments, determining pay and enforcing relevant rules since Haynes signed a franchise deal agreement with the company in 2010.

In August, however, the court ruled that corporate franchisors could be held liable for labor law violations at the state level even if they were not the ones making direct personnel decisions.

The motion filed recently seeking class certification says that the timekeeping and payroll practices undertaken by McDonald’s offers common Class-wide evidence since McDonald’s employees are required to punch in and out of work using a shared point-of-sale system.

The plaintiffs state that this system can provide evidence that workers were denied legally mandated rest and meal breaks.

“Under California law, plaintiffs need only prove that class members shared the reasonable belief, based on inferences drawn from commonly shared materials and experiences, that Haynes was acting on McDonald’s behalf or was a part of McDonald’s,” the motion for Class certification states.

Even though employees have already reached a preliminary settlement with Haynes, they assert that they are still seeking injunctive relief because McDonald’s exerts control over the software settings of the in-store processors system that plaintiffs say has resulted in several violations.

The McDonald’s Rest Break Class Action Lawsuit is Guadalupe Salazar, et al. v. McDonald’s Corp., et al., Case No. 3:14-cv-02096 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.

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