PITTSBURGH – An Allentown man who worked as a waiter for more than six years has filed a class action lawsuit, claiming that tipped, non-exempt servers like himself were shortchanged out of mandated wages, in violation of both state and federal laws.
Paris Cooks (on behalf of himself and all others similarly-situated) of Allentown filed suit in the Allegheny County Court of Common Pleas on Sept. 12 versus Ovation Food Services, LP (doing business as “Spectra Food Services & Hospitality”), of Philadelphia.
“Defendant, Ovations Food Services LP (doing business as “Spectra Food Services & Hospitality”) is a food and beverage hospitality company that is headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and owns, operates and/or manages multiple dining locations throughout the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the United States. Defendant employs servers at these dining locations and compensates these servers with a sub-minimum wage for the hours they work,” the suit says.
“Plaintiff brings this class and collective action under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and the Pennsylvania Minimum Wage Act (PMWA), on behalf of himself and all servers who work or have worked for defendant during the applicable three-year statute of limitations.”
The suit adds that the defendant violated the above-mentioned federal and state laws, leaving their servers without funds that should have been due them.
“Defendant committed federal and state minimum wage violations, because it failed to provide servers with statutorily required tip notice and further required servers to spend an impermissible amount of their shifts performing non-tipped work that did not require the servers to have customer interaction,” the suit states.
“Defendant further committed federal and state overtime wage violations, because it failed to compensate servers at the appropriate federal and state overtime rates, when servers worked in excess of 40 hours in a workweek. As a result, plaintiff and all similarly-situated servers have been denied federal and state minimum and overtime wages and tips, during various workweeks within the relevant time period.”
According to the suit, anyone who worked as a server for the defendant within the past three years, was paid a sub-minimum wage and required to perform more than 40 hours of work in a single workweek within the past three years, would be eligible to join the class.
For counts of federal minimum wage violations, state minimum wage violations, federal overtime wage violations and state overtime wage violations, the plaintiff is seeking unliquidated federal and state minimum wage damages, the tip credit unlawfully claimed by defendant, liquidated damages, reasonable attorneys’ fees and litigation costs, and any and all such further relief as this Court deems just and reasonable under the circumstances.
The plaintiff is represented by Tyler S. Setcavage and Matthew T. Logue of Quinn Logue in Pittsburgh, plus Jordan Richards of USA Employment Lawyers, in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.
The defendant has not yet secured legal counsel.
Allegheny County Court of Common Pleas case GD-23-010599
From the Pennsylvania Record: Reach Courts Reporter Nicholas Malfitano at nick.malfitano@therecordinc.com