Farmers Insurance Agrees to Pay More Than $1.5 Million In Back Wages
Thousand of Farmers Insurance Company employees have just learned that they will be paid more than $1.5 million in overtime-back wages. The workers were never compensated for work they performed pre-shift – activities such as turning on work stations, logging into the company phone system and inserting software applications necessary to begin their call center duties.
Under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) all employees who are not exempt must be paid at a rate of one and one-half times your regular rate of pay. This generally includes any pre- and post- shift work you must perform on the job. Here, a U.S. Department of Labor investigation determined that Farmer’s Insurance had significant and systemic violations on the federal FLSA’s overtime and record-keeping provisions. These violations occurred across the country at customer-service call centers in Florida, Texas, Oregon, Michigan, Kansas and Oklahoma.
The investigation revealed that employees spent an average of 30 minutes on unrecorded and uncompensated duties – primarily pre-shift work getting ready to begin their call center duties. As the result of the investigation, the employees are now entitled to time and a half of their regular rate of pay for time worked in excess of 40 hours while performing those duties.
As state by Secretary of Labor Hilda L. Solis, “Failing to properly compensate employees for pre- or post-shift work is a violation of federal law. The Labor Department is committed to ensuring that employers abide by the law so that workers are protected against exploitation and law-abiding employers are not placed at a competitive disadvantage.”
If you believe you have not received all the compensation you are entitled to, please contact the dedicated Atlanta workers rights attorneys at Buckley & Klein, LLP. We are committed to ensuring employees receive all the compensation they deserve.
