Rhode Island’s second-largest hospital will pay $1.9 million in back wages to employees denied overtime and other compensation.
Kent County Memorial Hospital in Warwick has been the center of a labor investigation that impacted eight hundred and fifty-three medical care staff. The investigation found the employer guilty of improperly paying employees who had worked diligently through the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division investigation, Hartford District Office, revealed that the healthcare provider had wrongly deducted workers’ paid breaks.
Rhode Island Healthcare Group to pay $1.9 million in back wages
“The Wage and Hour Division is eager to return the $1.9 million in wages and liquidated damages we recovered to the workers who put their needs second and delivered essential care to the many people in Rhode Island who suffered during the pandemic,” said Wage and Hour Administrator Jessica Looman. “An administrative resolution like this allows affected workers to collect their hard-earned wages promptly.”
The Wage and Hour Division report stated that Kent County Memorial Hospital had been negligent in not allowing its staff, who were dealing with an overflow of seriously ill patients, the legally required break.
In most instances, the congestion of patients and the demands placed on the hospital prevented those working from taking breaks; however, the employer automatically deducted these break periods from staff.
The report detailed the severity of the issue as staff “in the emergency room and other departments worked more than 40 hours in a workweek but weren’t properly compensated when they worked through their break.”
As a result of the investigation, Kent County Memorial Hospital has agreed to comply with improved record and timekeeping protocols to avoid further breaches of the Fair Labor Standards Act.
In 2024, the Department of Labor reportedly concluded 2,376 investigations in healthcare industries, recovering over $37 million in back wages for nearly 30,000 workers nationwide.
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