| Please read the Federal Regulations that require you to be paid for all the time that you work. These same Federal Regulations require that you be completely relieved of your duties during your meal period. | ||
Our team of attorneys is currently investigating whether to file a lawsuit against Sutter Health and related entities (referred to in this notice as “Sutter Health”). The investigation relates to how Sutter Health paid its hourly employees and whether it had employees work through part or all of their meal periods but did not pay them for that meal period.
No lawsuit has been filed and there has been no determination whether Sutter Health did anything wrong. There is no money available now and no guarantee there will be. However, if you:
You may have legal rights to protect and you have a choice to make as to whether you contact our legal team to participate.
You may if you:
To find out if our legal team may represent you and ask for back wages for you, you need to contact us.
Yes. If you are awarded money under federal law, you will likely be able to collect back wages for the three years immediately prior to the date of filing of your consent to join the lawsuit. Therefore, every day that you wait to contact our legal team means you could be losing some or all of your claim. If you do want to find out what, if anything, you may be owed, you should contact our legal team at once. However, you will not be represented by the law firm until a case is filed, you decide to participate in the case, and your consent form is filed with the court.
In a collective (or class) action lawsuit, one or more people called "Class Representatives" sue on behalf of other people who have similar claims. The current and former employees who submit their consent forms together are a "Class" or "Class Members." The individuals who sued—and all the Class Members like them—are called the plaintiffs. The company that is sued (for example, if this lawsuit is filed, Sutter Health) is called the defendant. Unless each employee's case ends up being tried separately, one Court resolves the issues for everyone in the Class—except for those people who choose not to join the Class.
In the lawsuit that the employees are considering bringing, the employees may say that Sutter Health failed to pay hourly employees for all the time that Sutter Health permitted them to do work. Specifically, employees may say that among other things, Sutter Health implemented an automatic meal deduction policy under which hourly employees were not paid for their meal periods, even though the employees did some work during those meal periods.
If the lawsuit is filed, the employees will ask that because Sutter Health did not pay overtime as required by law, they are owed that unpaid overtime, as well as additional damages allowed by the law and your attorneys' fees.
No lawsuit has been filed and a Court hasn't decided whether Sutter Health or the employees are correct. In this case, the Court has not yet determined whether the employees have similar enough claims that it makes sense to have those claims combined in one case. Further, our legal team has not completed its investigation to determine if it makes sense to file a lawsuit against Sutter Health. Therefore, there is no money available now.
If a lawsuit is filed and people have had the chance to opt in, the Court will decide whether people who have opted in may participate in the case as class members. Only people "similarly situated" to the plaintiffs may participate as class members. To determine whether you are indeed a proper member of the class, Sutter Health will likely ask the Court to engage in a review of the circumstances of your employment with Sutter Health, taking into account factors such as employment setting, recording and payment for time worked, any defenses asserted against you by Sutter Health, and other procedural issues.
To assist in our investigation of Sutter Health, please contact our legal team so that we may learn more about your situation. Your name will be kept strictly confidential by our legal team until you decide if you want to seek any back wages. You will not be represented by our legal team unless we file a lawsuit, you decide to participate by submitting your consent form, and your consent form is filed by the law firm in court.
If you fail to contact our legal team, or seek representation elsewhere, you will not be allowed to participate in any recovery for the federal overtime claims in this lawsuit and may be jeopardizing your right to sue.
If you do nothing, and a lawsuit is filed in which you do not participate, you will not be bound by any decision on the federal overtime suit. Therefore, you will not be entitled to any recovery should there be any for those claims in that suit.
You can also ask another lawyer if you are owed back wages, or you can start your own lawsuit against Sutter Health. You'll have to hire and likely pay your own lawyer for that lawsuit, and you'll have to prove your claims. If you do exclude yourself so you can start or continue your own lawsuit against Sutter Health, you should talk to your own lawyer soon, because your claims may be subject to a statute of limitations of two or three years.
Sutter Health will not know that you contacted us unless a lawsuit is actually filed, you ask to participate, and your consent form is filed in court. Then you would be one of a number of employees whose forms are filed seeking back pay. Further, Sutter Health is prohibited from taking any action against you should you join any lawsuit that may be filed. Such conduct would also be illegal and you would be entitled to additional damages should a court determine Sutter Health took any adverse employment action against you for joining such a lawsuit.
Not unless you hired a lawyer. The law firm of Thomas & Solomon LLP are lawyers investigating the potential case against Sutter Health. They are experienced in handling similar cases against other employers. More information about the law firm, its practices, and its lawyers' experience is available at theemploymentattorneys.com.
No. Thomas & Solomon LLP's representation of you would only start once our investigation has concluded, you decide to participate in a lawsuit our legal team may file, your claims are eligible for inclusion in that lawsuit, and you sign a consent form that is filed in court. You would not be represented by our legal team before that. Once that has occurred, you would be represented by these attorneys only for the claims raised in the complaint that initiates that lawsuit.
You do not need to hire your own lawyer if you and Thomas & Solomon LLP agree that it should represent you, something that will occur only once we have concluded our investigation, have decided to file a lawsuit, you decide to participate in the lawsuit, and your consent form is filed with the court. If you want your own lawyer before then, or instead of Thomas & Solomon LLP, you will likely have to pay that lawyer. However, you can ask him or her to evaluate your case, file a complaint, or appear in court for you if you want someone other than Thomas & Solomon LLP to speak for you.
If a lawsuit is filed and the attorneys get money or benefits for the employees, they may ask the Court for fees and expenses. Typically, if a case settles a portion of the settlement is approved by the court as attorney fees. Costs of the lawsuit are also typically paid out of the settlement fund. These fees and costs reduce the amount the plaintiffs recover. In no case would you be asked to spend your own money for attorney fees or costs. You won't have to pay these fees and expenses out-of-pocket. If the Court grants the lawyers' request, the fees and expenses would be either deducted from any money obtained for the Class or paid separately by Sutter Health. If there is no recovery you are not obligated to pay fees or costs.
If the Plaintiffs obtain money or benefits as a result of the trial or a settlement, you will be notified about how to participate. We do not know how long this will take.
On this website, the lawyers for the employees have put additional information about the case. You can also contact our legal team at:
Hospital Overtime Class Action Lawsuits & Investigations
Thomas & Solomon LLP
693 East Avenue
Rochester, NY 14607
877.272.4066
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