Federal court orders Pennsylvania home healthcare agency Wyncote Wellness LLC to pay $810K in back wages, damages to 196 workers denied minimum wage, overtime.
Wyncote Wellness LLC also must pay civil money penalties for willful violations.
WYNCOTE, PA (USPress.News) The U.S. Department of Labor has obtained a consent judgment requiring Wyncote Wellness LLC and its owner, Dominique Conner, to pay 196 direct care employees a total of $810,320 in back wages and liquidated damages for routinely not paying workers overtime rates and willfully violating federal law.
The consent judgment, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, follows an investigation by the department’s Wage and Hour Division, which found that Wyncote Wellness LLC routinely violated the minimum wage and overtime provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act.
The investigation revealed that Wyncote Wellness regularly failed to pay employees the required overtime rate. Instead, it paid employees with multiple clients with separate checks for each client they worked with weekly. Instead of combining hours worked in a week to calculate overtime rates, Wyncote Wellness paid overtime after employees worked more than 40 hours with each client. Additionally, the department found that employees frequently recorded more hours than they were paid by the employer and were not compensated for travel time between clients The employer also failed to preserve records of hours worked, including travel time between clients when employees worked with multiple clients daily.
“Home healthcare workers provide vital services to the most vulnerable members of our communities, and their work deserves respect and fair compensation,” said Wage and Hour Division District Director James Cain in Philadelphia “This enforcement action will help to ensure workers are paid their total earnings and remind other employers of their obligations under the law.”
In addition to back wages and liquidated damages, the consent judgment requires Wyncote Wellness to pay a civil money penalty the department assessed for the willfulness of the violations.
“Our efforts resulted in securing the consent judgment and recovering hard-earned wages for the home health workers. This case demonstrates the U.S. Department of Labor’s commitment to pursuing litigation when employers fail to comply with the law,” said Regional Solicitor Samantha Thomas in Philadelphia.
The division’s Philadelphia District Office conducted the investigation, and the department’s Office of the Solicitor in Philadelphia filed the complaint and consent judgment.
The FLSA requires that most employees in the U.S. be paid at least the federal minimum wage for all hours worked and overtime pay at not less than time and one-half their regular rate of pay for all hours worked over 40 in a workweek.
ATTENTION EMPLOYERS: There are rules and laws that must be followed. You cannot make your own rules to suit your budget or ideology. Yes, the law is confusing. If you don’t understand, seek professional help from an attorney or payroll company to help ensure that you are fair with your employees while complying with the law. Otherwise, the consequences are severe. Eventually, an unhappy employee will call the proper authorities.
We publish these articles hoping that employers can learn from the mistakes made by other employers.
Restaurants are among the most common violators. For a couple of years, the U.S. Department of Labor has been transparent about its nationwide initiative to protect employees in the food service industry.
We aim to educate and encourage employers to take their responsibilities seriously. An employer acts in a similar role to a fiduciary.
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Labor
