Saint Trading Co. Inc.\u2014a hotel staffing agency on Saipan\u2014is being made to pay $163,327 in back wages and liquidated damages to 73 employees for violating the minimum wage and overtime provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act. <\/p>\n
Additionally, the U.S. Department of Labor\u2019s Wage and Hour Division imposed a penalty of $40,150 on Saint Trading because of the repeat nature of the violations.<\/p>\n
WHD investigators found Saint Trading Co. Inc. failed to combine hours that some employees worked at multiple locations during the workweek when determining whether overtime was due. This practice resulted in violations when workers\u2019 totals exceeded 40 hours per week, yet they were paid only straight time rates for the hours they worked at each separate location. The employer also violated the minimum wage requirements when it failed to reimburse employees for job-required medical exams, and food-handler trainings and certifications. The employer also failed to record or pay employees for the time they spent securing these items.<\/p>\n
In 2013, U.S. Labor found that Saint Trading violated similar FLSA provisions by failing to pay employees for all the hours they worked, including time they spent working before and after their scheduled shifts, and during their unpaid meal breaks. Investigators at that time also found that Saint Trading failed to combine all the hours worked at multiple job sites for purposes of determining and paying overtime hours\u2014a practice found to be ongoing in the current investigation. These violations resulted in Saint Trading paying $23,745 in back wages following the previous investigation.<\/p>\n
\u201cEmployers that continue to operate in violation of federal labor laws can be subject to significant civil money penalties in addition to back wages and liquidates damages owed to employees,\u201d said Wage and Hour Division district director Terence Trotter, in Honolulu, Hawaii. \u201cThe U.S. Department of Labor is committed to ensuring a level playing field for law-abiding employers, and urges all employers to use the\u00a0tools we offer\u00a0to understand their responsibilities and avoid costly violations.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Employers that discover overtime or minimum wage violations may\u00a0self-report and resolve\u00a0those violations without litigation through the\u00a0PAID program.\u00a0For more information about the\u00a0FLSA\u00a0and other laws enforced by the Wage and Hour Division, contact the division\u2019s toll-free helpline at 866-4US-WAGE (487-9243). Information is also available at\u00a0www.dol.gov\/whd including a\u00a0search tool\u00a0for workers who may be owed back wages collected by WHD. (PR)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Saint Trading Co. Inc.\u2014a hotel staffing agency on Saipan\u2014is being made to pay $163,327 in…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-301034","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301034","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=301034"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/301034\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=301034"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=301034"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=301034"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}