The Motion for
Class Certification has been denied, however, an appeal has been filed.
Since the
California Supreme Court announced a big decision in Brinker Rest. Corp. v.
Superior Court. This decision has made our appeal favorable. The decision
clarifies some laws as they pertain to employers and employees, and sets forth
a simple three part test for meal period compliance.
More
information regarding the Brinker Rest. Corp. v. Superior Court can be
found: http://quintilonelaw.net/the-california-supreme-court-announces-big-brinker-decision-for-employees.
EMTs Win their Appeal
In June 2013, a California appeals court ordered the certification of two classes of employees suing a pair of ambulance companies for allegedly cutting their hourly pay and overtime compensation when they worked long shifts, overturning a lower court's decision that the classes had been poorly defined.
Contrary to the trial court's opinion, the two would-be classes of employees were all subjected to a set of uniform pay policies by Bowers Cos. Inc. and Pacific Ambulance Inc. that applied "to readily ascertainable groups of employees," suiting those claims to being determined on a classwide basis, according to the appeals court.
"We remand the matter to the trial court with directions to certify the regular rate and overtime classes based on modified class definitions," Associate Justice Richard Aronson wrote for the court. The panel affirmed state Superior Court Judge Nancy Wieben Stock's decision that three other proposed subclasses, each making a different allegation — accusing Bowers and Pacific of failing to provide mandatory breaks, accurate pay stubs and payment of outstanding wages to employees who were fired or quit — should not be certified because all the workers were not bound by common issues.
William Gonzales and Joshua Kahane, two emergency medical technicians who worked for Bowers and Pacific — which have a common management team but separate sets of nurses, EMTs and other field employees working in different countries — each filed putative class actions against the companies that were consolidated in May 2010, according to the ruling.
Their lawsuits stemmed from pay policies that the companies, which operate around the clock and provide nonemergency medical transport services, enacted after their employees voted to authorize a new four-day workweek consisting of 10-plus hour days. Under the new schedule, employees would earn their regularly hourly pay for the first 10 hours, overtime for two hours beyond that, and double pay for any hours in excess of 12, the appeals court said.
Bowers workers voted to institute those changes in 2000 while Pacific workers signed on to the new "alternative work week" in 2003, according to the ruling. But the four-day week became so popular that the ambulance companies struggled to fill their regular eight- and 10-hour shifts, and years later the medical transport companies decided to incentivize those shifts by upping the hourly rate for them, in an attempt to offset the overtime that could be earned from working longer hours. Bowers made the change in 2008 while Pacific followed in 2010.
Gonzales and Kahane's suits made a slew of wage-and-hour violations against the companies, including accusations that the companies wrongly docked its employees' hourly pay when they worked longer shifts, failed to pay them all the straight and overtime wages they were entitled, and didn't provide them with breaks or legally compliant pay stubs.
The EMTs motioned for certification of the five classes in October 2011, but it was shot down by the trial court, which found that the putative classes were overly broad, that it was impossible to ascertain the number of members in each of them and that the EMTs had failed to show that common issues united all the class members.
When it came to the docked-pay and overtime classes, the appeals court, citing the California Supreme Court's landmark April 2012 Brinker decision, disagreed — saying there was plenty of evidence that an allegedly unlawful uniform policy had been imposed on all the employees in question.
"Plaintiffs' theory of recovery defines a group of unnamed plaintiffs with a purported right to recover based on objective characteristics and transactional facts," the court ruled. The appellate panel also disagreed with the trial court's findings that the workers had failed to specify when the alleged wrongdoing had occurred and that their class definitions were so vague that there was no way to pin down who could be a class member. The court ruled that payroll records identified all the field employees who worked 12- to 24-hour shifts at lower hourly rates after the companies debuted their short-shift incentive programs.
But the justices found that substantial evidence backed up Judge Stock's refusals to certify the other classes, noting how common issues did not bind all the members of the putative class of workers who were allegedly not paid in a timely fashion and that the EMTs had failed to demonstrate how their wage statements were false.
Representatives for the parties could not be immediately reached for comment Friday. Justices Richard Aronson, Kathleen O'Leary and David Thompson sat on the panel for the Fourth Appellate District.
At that time, Bowers Cos. Inc. and Pacific Ambulance Inc. are represented by Silverstein & Huston.
The workers are represented by the Law Office of Joseph Antonelli, Richard E. Quintilone II Esq. of Quintilone & Associates, the Law Offices of Kevin T. Barnes, the Carter Law Firm, Phelps Law Group, and the Cooper Law Firm.
The case is Bowers Companies Wage and Hour Cases, case number G046104, in the Fourth Appellate District of the Court of Appeal of the State of California.
EMTs Win their Appeal
In June 2013, a California appeals court ordered the certification of two classes of employees suing a pair of ambulance companies for allegedly cutting their hourly pay and overtime compensation when they worked long shifts, overturning a lower court's decision that the classes had been poorly defined.
Contrary to the trial court's opinion, the two would-be classes of employees were all subjected to a set of uniform pay policies by Bowers Cos. Inc. and Pacific Ambulance Inc. that applied "to readily ascertainable groups of employees," suiting those claims to being determined on a classwide basis, according to the appeals court.
"We remand the matter to the trial court with directions to certify the regular rate and overtime classes based on modified class definitions," Associate Justice Richard Aronson wrote for the court. The panel affirmed state Superior Court Judge Nancy Wieben Stock's decision that three other proposed subclasses, each making a different allegation — accusing Bowers and Pacific of failing to provide mandatory breaks, accurate pay stubs and payment of outstanding wages to employees who were fired or quit — should not be certified because all the workers were not bound by common issues.
William Gonzales and Joshua Kahane, two emergency medical technicians who worked for Bowers and Pacific — which have a common management team but separate sets of nurses, EMTs and other field employees working in different countries — each filed putative class actions against the companies that were consolidated in May 2010, according to the ruling.
Their lawsuits stemmed from pay policies that the companies, which operate around the clock and provide nonemergency medical transport services, enacted after their employees voted to authorize a new four-day workweek consisting of 10-plus hour days. Under the new schedule, employees would earn their regularly hourly pay for the first 10 hours, overtime for two hours beyond that, and double pay for any hours in excess of 12, the appeals court said.
Bowers workers voted to institute those changes in 2000 while Pacific workers signed on to the new "alternative work week" in 2003, according to the ruling. But the four-day week became so popular that the ambulance companies struggled to fill their regular eight- and 10-hour shifts, and years later the medical transport companies decided to incentivize those shifts by upping the hourly rate for them, in an attempt to offset the overtime that could be earned from working longer hours. Bowers made the change in 2008 while Pacific followed in 2010.
Gonzales and Kahane's suits made a slew of wage-and-hour violations against the companies, including accusations that the companies wrongly docked its employees' hourly pay when they worked longer shifts, failed to pay them all the straight and overtime wages they were entitled, and didn't provide them with breaks or legally compliant pay stubs.
The EMTs motioned for certification of the five classes in October 2011, but it was shot down by the trial court, which found that the putative classes were overly broad, that it was impossible to ascertain the number of members in each of them and that the EMTs had failed to show that common issues united all the class members.
When it came to the docked-pay and overtime classes, the appeals court, citing the California Supreme Court's landmark April 2012 Brinker decision, disagreed — saying there was plenty of evidence that an allegedly unlawful uniform policy had been imposed on all the employees in question.
"Plaintiffs' theory of recovery defines a group of unnamed plaintiffs with a purported right to recover based on objective characteristics and transactional facts," the court ruled. The appellate panel also disagreed with the trial court's findings that the workers had failed to specify when the alleged wrongdoing had occurred and that their class definitions were so vague that there was no way to pin down who could be a class member. The court ruled that payroll records identified all the field employees who worked 12- to 24-hour shifts at lower hourly rates after the companies debuted their short-shift incentive programs.
But the justices found that substantial evidence backed up Judge Stock's refusals to certify the other classes, noting how common issues did not bind all the members of the putative class of workers who were allegedly not paid in a timely fashion and that the EMTs had failed to demonstrate how their wage statements were false.
Representatives for the parties could not be immediately reached for comment Friday. Justices Richard Aronson, Kathleen O'Leary and David Thompson sat on the panel for the Fourth Appellate District.
At that time, Bowers Cos. Inc. and Pacific Ambulance Inc. are represented by Silverstein & Huston.
The workers are represented by the Law Office of Joseph Antonelli, Richard E. Quintilone II Esq. of Quintilone & Associates, the Law Offices of Kevin T. Barnes, the Carter Law Firm, Phelps Law Group, and the Cooper Law Firm.
The case is Bowers Companies Wage and Hour Cases, case number G046104, in the Fourth Appellate District of the Court of Appeal of the State of California.
