On January 8, 2016, nurses who work for On-Call Staffing of Tennessee, Inc. and On-Call Staffing, Inc. filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Western District of Tennessee for overtime violations under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act. The plaintiffs filed the complaint on behalf of themselves and all similarly situated home-health nurses, private duty nurses, field nurses, or nurses in similar positions who worked for On-Call Staffing in the past three years.
In the complaint, the nurses allege the company avoided its wage payment obligations in two ways. First, On-Call Staffing misclassified nurses as independent contractors rather than employees. Second, the company reduced the nurses' regularly hourly rates each week according to the number of hours they worked. As the nurses allege, this allowed the company to fashion an artificial regular rate so that the company appeared to be providing overtime pay, when it in fact was not. The plaintiffs seek unpaid overtime premiums and liquidated damages (double damages).
The company, along with its predecessor corporation Guardian Angel Nursing, Inc. were previously sued by nurses for unpaid overtime in 2007. On July 31, 2008, the Middle District of Tennessee ruled that On-Call Staffing nurses qualified as employees, and not independent contractors, who were therefore entitled to overtime pay. The case was entitled, Wilson v. Guardian Angel Nursing, Inc., Case No. 3:07-0069. The nurses in this new complaint allege that On-Call Staffing continues to engage in this misclassification today.
Plaintiff's attorney Rebekah Bailey explained, "home-health nurses like Plaintiffs work a lot of overtime hours and are legally entitled to extra pay for these hours. On-Call Staffing has known this since at least 2008 and continues to violate the law."
Plaintiffs are represented by Rachhana T. Srey and Rebekah L. Bailey from Nichols Kaster, PLLP, which has offices in Minneapolis, Minnesota and San Francisco, California. Plaintiffs are also represented by William B. Ryan and Janelle C. Osowski from Donati Law, PLLC in Memphis, Tennessee. The case is entitled, Robinson et al. v. On-Call Staffing of Tennessee, Inc. et al. No.: 2:16-cv-02018 (Western District of Tennessee).
Additional information about how to make a claim in the case may be found at www.nka.com or by calling Nichols Kaster, PLLP toll free at (877) 344-4628.
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