Denying full wages, deducting for meal breaks and failing to keep time and payroll records has left a California senior living provider on the hook for more than $690,000 in back wages and penalties.
A federal court recently approved a consent judgment ordering Neldy’s R.C. Inc, operating as Neldy’s Adult Residential Care Home, to pay $$345,348 in back wages and an equal amount in liquidated damages to 108 workers, along with $25,000 in civil penalties for what it said were willful violations of the Fair Labor Standards Act.
The US Department of Labor Wage and Hour Division said that an investigation found that Neldy’s purposely did not count all hours worked by employees, and that it paid employees with multiple paychecks to hide its illegal practices. Investigators also found that the company deducted meal breaks for workers’ wages when their duties required them to work during their breaks and that it did not keep time and payroll records.
Neldy’s, which operates residential facilities at 12 locations in Orange and Riverside counties in the Golden State, had a history of labor violations, according to the Labor Department.
Previous investigations into the company’s pay practices for 2013 through 2016 led to a recovery of $1 million for 58 workers after violations of minimum wage and overtime FLSA provisions were found.
“The court’s action and our investigation send a clear message to unscrupulous care industry employers that we will hold them accountable for their attempts to exploit their workers and deprive them of their hard-earned wages,” Min Park-Chung, Wage and Hour Division district director in San Diego, said in a statement. “The fact that the operator of Neldy’s Adult Residential Care Home continues to abuse their workers’ rights so blatantly despite their prior violations is truly appalling.”
California’s Industrial Welfare Commission instituted a series of wage orders to protect employees in a variety of industry groups, including residential care facility employees. State law requires a 30-minute, duty-free, uninterrupted meal break, during which employees cannot be asked to perform duties.
