Carter Express is a transportation and logistics company with trucking cargo yards in Texas, Arkansas, Alabama, Tennessee, Indiana, Ohio, and Michigan. Carter Express employs yard drivers to drive shunt trucks carrying semi-trailers and containers around their terminals.
The lawsuit alleges that the yard drivers often work 45 or more hours per week but are not properly paid for that time. The Plaintiff seeks to recover unpaid overtime and other damages on behalf of himself and all similarly situated yard drivers.
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This lawsuit alleges that Carter Express, Inc. violated the Fair Labor Standards Act and Ohio law by failing to pay yard drivers overtime pay. Federal law requires employers to pay non-exempt employees at a rate of time-and-one-half of their regular rate for any hours worked over forty in a workweek. Instead of paying yard drivers an overtime rate of pay for hours worked over forty, Carter Express, Inc. paid yard drivers the same rate for all hours worked. Although Carter Express, Inc. recently started paying drivers time-and-one-half for hours worked over forty-five in a given workweek, the company continues to pay yard drivers their regular hourly rate for hours worked between forty and forty-five in a given workweek.
The Plaintiff also alleges that these violating policies were applied to all of the company’s yard drivers. Because the Plaintiff alleges that the company’s pay practices harmed all of the yard drivers, he seeks to recover back wages and other damages for himself and other similarly situated workers. Under the Fair Labor Standards Act, a Plaintiff alleging that a violating policy was applied uniformly to other employees may act as the representative of other employees who choose to join the case, or “opt-in”. If the Court allows the case to proceed as a Collective Action, similarly-situated employees will receive a notice via mail and email and have the option to join the case. However, there is no requirement that a potential opt-in Plaintiff wait until they receive notice from the court – other similarly situated employees can join the case even before the court authorizes sending out notice.
Failure to Pay Overtime
First, the Plaintiff alleges that the company does not pay its yard drivers workers overtime for all hours worked over forty in a workweek.
The yard driver’s position is that federal law requires employers to track employees’ hours and pay a rate of time-and-one-half of the regular rate if the employee works over forty hours in a week. The Plaintiff alleges that despite regularly having to work over forty hours in a week, Carter Express, Inc. paid employees on the same hourly rate regardless of how many hours were worked. Though the yard drivers now receive time-and-a-half of their regular rate for hours worked over forty-five in a workweek, they continue to receive straight time for hours between 40 and 45.
Untimely Payment of Wages
Second, the Plaintiff alleged that the company failed to pay all wages due timely. Ohio’s Prompt Pay Act, O.R.C. § 4113.15(A) requires employers to pay employees’ wages on regular pay schedules. The law specifies that wages must be paid on or before the first day of each month, for wages earned during the first half of the preceding month ending with the fifteenth day thereof, and on or before the fifteenth day of each month, for wages earned during the last half of the preceding calendar month. The Plaintiff alleges that Carter Express, Inc. violated this law by failing to pay them their overtime wages when they were due.