South Bay car wash owner pays $270,000 in back wages

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.mercurynews.com/breakingnews/ci_12057284

By Jessie Mangaliman

Mercury News
Posted: 04/02/2009 03:14:35 PM PDT

The owner of car wash businesses in Mountain View and Sunnyvale has paid the federal government about $270,000, the back wages of hundreds of employees who were prevented from clocking in and not paid for the time they were made to wait for customers to arrive.

The U.S. Labor Department has recovered the wages and will begin distributing them to 270 employees of Lozano, Inc.

A labor investigation found that Lozano, Inc. required workers to arrive for regular work schedules, but were not allowed to clock in until there were customers at the car washes. The minimum-wage workers, labor officials said, waited between 15 minutes to an hour being placed on the work clock.

"This seems to be the pattern," said Deanne Amaden, regional spokeswoman for labor department's office in San Francisco. "They weren't getting paid for the time they were waiting."

A telephone message to Manuel Lozano, president of the company, was not returned.

FULL story at link.

[ConcernedCanuk]

1. As a previous taxi driver, I kept track of my hours, commission and tips.

.
.
.

After a discussion with my employer about paying up to the minimum wage level(required by law) - I sent her a letter repeating the verbal request.

I was fired the next day.

My request had been for $1,200

Ministry of labour after 5 months of investigation sent me a check

for TEN GRAND :bounce:


keep track of your time, and any expenses incurred.

When those ministries get involved, the penalties awarded can way surpass the lost wages, at least in my instance, as I was awarded the maximum allowable as my job loss was considered a reprisal for trying to get my normal rights.

OH -

I went fishing/camping for three months, bought some solar panels, batteries,

yeah - I enjoyed the "bonus"

I never expected squat really, but I'm a fighter.

(so were the bass that summer)

:silly: