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Judge Upholds Overtime Pay Ruling for Resurrection Home Health Workers |
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More than 50 employees at Resurrection Health Care may be eligible for as much as $500,000 in back wages after an administrative law judge denied the hospital chain’s appeal of an Illinois Department of Labor ruling that management violated the state’s labor law on overtime pay.
Late last month Administrative Law Judge Claudia Manley rejected Resurrection’s challenge to the audit process the state used to determine the amount of back pay the health care system owes employees in its Home Health Services division. Several employees filed a complaint in 2004 charging Resurrection consistently failed to pay them for hours worked beyond their normal schedules.
After conducting audits of the hours worked by those employees, the state found that Resurrection owed more than $59,000 in back pay to the first seven employees whose cases were audited. Subsequently, some 45 more employees in the same division have filed complaints regarding lack of overtime pay. The state Labor Department is currently conducting audits of those cases to determine the amount of back pay owed. The findings could result in as much as $500,000 in back pay for the workers.
In her decision, Manley found that audit estimates of overtime hours were reasonable and Resurrection’s arguments were “disingenuous,” saying,
an employer should not be allowed to benefit from its lack of recordkeeping.
Click here to read Manley’s decision.
Henry Bayer, executive director of AFSCME Council 31, says Resurrection Health Care should stop its stalling tactics and pay these employees what the law requires.
It is appalling that the company broke the law and failed to pay these low-income workers what was owed to them.
Resurrection workers have been fighting to win a voice at work with AFSCME Council 31 for four years in the face of intense management opposition. Last year, the National Labor Relations Board issued a complaint against Resurrection alleging the company violated federal labor law by interfering with and coercing employees who are trying to join a union. Employees are seeking union representation because of concerns over the impact of the hospital chain’s rapid expansion on patient care and working conditions.
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