On Thursday, July 16, 2015, several field service specialists filed a Fair Labor Standards Act Complaint in federal court against Abbott Laboratories, Inc. The named Plaintiffs filed their FLSA claims on behalf of themselves and other “similarly situated" employees, which include “core lab specialists,” “prism specialists,” “hematology support specialists,” and other titles performing similar duties (collectively “field service specialists”), who worked for the company anywhere in the United States during the past three years. The Complaint alleges that Abbott Laboratories willfully denied its field service specialists overtime pay by improperly classifying them as exempt from the FLSA’s overtime protections. The Complaint alleges that in this position, the named Plaintiffs and those similarly situated performed non-exempt work that includes installing, repairing, troubleshooting, servicing, and maintaining testing devices and equipment manufactured by Abbott Laboratories. The named Plaintiffs were paid a salary and received no overtime compensation for the many overtime hours they worked. These employees seek to recover unpaid overtime and double damages.
Abbott Laboratories, Inc. is an Illinois company with its corporate headquarters located in Abbott Park, Illinois. It is global healthcare company that maintains a portfolio of science-based offerings in diagnostics, medical devices, nutritionals, and branded pharmaceuticals. Its medical testing and diagnostic instrument systems are used worldwide by hospitals, laboratories, blood banks, and physician offices to diagnose and monitor diseases.
Reena I. Desai, who represents the plaintiffs stated, “The Department of Labor has had a long-standing position that employees that perform work which consists of installation, diagnosis and repair of equipment, like Abbott Laboratories’ field service specialists, are not exempt from federal overtime protections. Our lawsuit seeks to recover the overtime pay that we allege Abbott Laboratories has unfairly denied to its employees who do this type of work.”
Plaintiffs are represented by Reena I. Desai, Timothy C. Selander, and Rachhana T. Srey from Nichols Kaster, PLLP, which has offices in Minneapolis, Minnesota and San Francisco, California, and Ryan Stephan, of Stephan Zouras, LLP in Chicago, Illinois. The case was filed in federal court in the Northern District of Illinois, Court File No. 1:15-cv-06223.
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