An Arizona drywall contractor is being instructed to pay $1.7 million to two hundred and forty-six disgruntled workers.
The decision was made after the U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona ruled in favor of the employees after the Wage and Hours Division of the Department of Labor carried out an investigation.
The division found that Bean Drywall Inc. (Bean Drywall) failed to pay workers the proper rate for their hours, which breached the regulations in the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA).
Arizona contractor to pay $1.7 million
“Unfortunately, our investigations too often find construction employers engaged in illegal schemes to deny workers their hard-earned wages, obstruct enforcement agencies and gain an unfair advantage over their law-abiding competitors,” Wage and Hour Division District Director Eric Murray stated. “Since 2019, the Wage and Hour Division has recovered millions of dollars in back wages and damages owed to thousands of Arizona’s construction industry workers.”
The residential drywall contractor failed to reimburse the two hundred and forty-six workers for overtime rates and instead paid the affected workers straight-time or piece rates for all hours worked.
The settlement said that Bean Drywall would pay $875,000 in back wages and an equal amount in liquidated damages for the breach.
“Bean Drywall used fraudulent practices to disguise the theft of hundreds of thousands of dollars in wages earned by hundreds of employees,” Murray continued . “This employer’s willful and deceitful acts were designed to cover-up their inexcusable behavior.”
The Department of Labor has been stern on FLSA breaches as Due reported a case involving a U.S. Navy contractor. General Dynamics Corp. (General Dynamics) settled a wage dispute and paid workers $1.4M in damages as part of a recent investigation.
The workers in question were thirty-six Mexican engineers employed in San Diego by a defense contract titan General Dynamics subsidiary. General Dynamics employs over 100,000 people worldwide and has an estimated annual revenue (2023) of $42.3 billion.
It was alleged that the employees were paid in Mexican pesos at a rate equivalent to a salary well below the minimum wage, another Fair Labor Standards Act breach.
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