Lawsuit Alleges Apple Abuses IT Employees

San Diego, CAYou think that in this day and age, overtime lawsuits would be a thing of the past--especially California software developer lawsuits. After all, computers and computer professionals have been around for a long time now, long enough to make sure that everyone gets paid what they deserve. Unfortunately, some employers take advantage of IT personnel overtime, forcing their IT employees to work extra hours without properly paying them for that work.

And it is not just the little companies that are trying to save a buck--according to reports, even computer giants are violating California IT overtime laws and abusing their employees in the process.

According to InformationWeek, a lawsuit was filed against Apple, alleging that the company subjects its employees to conditions that resemble indentured servitude and violate California state law. The lawsuit claims that the employees--California IT workers--are not given proper overtime pay or meal benefits. Specifically, one Apple employee, David Walsh, the plaintiff in the lawsuit, says he was regularly forced to work more than 40 hours in a week, was denied meal breaks, and spent evenings and weekends on-call without receiving any extra pay for all those hours worked. On many occasions, Walsh was told that he had to maintain the network into the night, meaning he was required to be at work well after his regular 8 hour workday.

Walsh's on-call schedule, 7 days out of every 6 weeks, meant that he had to be on-call from the end of his regular workday on Friday to the beginning of his workday on Monday morning and was also forced to be on-call every night of the week with no compensation. Think about it: An entire week where he could not do anything that could not be interrupted. That means no movies, no going out, no appointments and very few leisure activities. While that may not seem so terrible, remember that he is alleging he had to to give that all up without being paid for doing so. If you are an IT worker on that schedule with a family, you would miss a lot of time with your family, and your children would suffer for it, too.

The lawsuit, which seeks to represent all of Apple's California IT workers, further claims that Apple management purposefully misclassified IT workers so that the company did not have to pay its employees for the overtime hours. "[Apple] intentionally and deliberately created numerous job levels and a multitude of job titles ... to create a roadblock to discovery and class certification for all employees similarly classified as exempt," the lawsuit states. For example, Walsh says that some employees are given the title "Senior" before "Network Engineer," even though all Network Engineers perform the same tasks. According to the lawsuit, those tasks included installing and maintaining networks.

One of the factors in determining whether or not an employee is exempt from overtime is whether or not the employee gets to exercise discretion in his or her job. Walsh says that during his time with Apple--12 years--he had no authority over where he could go and had to receive permission from executives and site staff.

"This is a position that involves no independent discretion, judgment, or management decisions with respect to matters of significance," the court papers state. "To the contrary, the work of the Network Support Staff Member is to provide, on a daily basis, network support services to end-users in accordance with the management decisions and business policies established by the DEFENDANTS. In fact, no installation, configuration or replacement of the network equipment may be made by any Network Support Staff Member without first obtaining approval from management..."

If Apple has misclassified employees to avoid paying overtime wages, then it has broken the law. Unfortunately, giving people false titles is not a new tactic to avoid paying fair wages. Many employees in companies are given titles such as "Senior" and told that they are then exempt from overtime pay. However, the job title does not determine whether or not a person should be paid overtime wages. That is determined by the actual work that the employee does. If the "Senior Network Engineer" and the "Network Engineer" perform the same duties, and the "Network Engineer" is paid for overtime, then both should be paid for their overtime hours. It is vital that employees not simply rely on their job title to determine whether or not they should be paid overtime.

Walsh's lawsuit alleges 6 different counts of labor violations over more than a decade, which could be costly for Apple if the company is found guilty of the allegations. He is demanding that Apple properly classify network engineers and compensate employees who were not given overtime pay or who missed meal breaks.

Walsh is not the first person to allege that computer companies abuse their employees and he probably will not be the last. If you identify with Walsh's story, it might be time to contact a lawyer to discuss whether or not you have a legitimate complaint against your employer.