Sykes Call Center Unpaid Wages Lawsuit

An unpaid wages lawsuit has been filed against Sykes Enterprises (SEI) alleging the company willfully violated the Fair Labor Standards Act. The unpaid wages claim seeks class action status on behalf of current or former SEI employees. Plaintiffs allege that they routinely performed work-related tasks for which they were not paid.

In 2013 a lawsuit was filed on behalf of current and former employees SEI, who alleged they routinely performed work-related duties that they were not paid for. Under Fact Sheet #64, issued by the US Department of Labor in 2008, call center employees must be paid from the start of the first principal activity of the workday to the end of the last principal activity of the workday.

A lawsuit against SEI alleges employees were required to perform duties such as logging in to several servers, starting up a suite of programs and downloading customer information but were not allowed to clock in for their shifts until that process was complete, which could take up to 10 minutes per session. The lawsuit also alleges that employees were automatically clocked out at the end of their shift even if they were in the middle of a phone call and were not compensated for time spent working after the end of the shift, including time spent helping customers and time spent logging out of computer systems.

In other words, employee pay is allegedly based on clock-in and clock-out time, but not on actual time spent in work-related duties.

At least one lawsuit was granted conditional class action status. The lawsuit (CASE 0:13-cv-00946-JRT-JJG) sought to represent all employees of Skyes Enterprises, Inc. and Alpine Access, Inc., who were not paid for off-the-clock work during the past three years. That lawsuit was filed in Minnesota.

A different lawsuit, Minor v. Sykes Enterprises, Inc., Case No. 8:2013cv00375 was filed in Florida Middle District Court.

Unpaid wages lawsuits have been filed against call centers alleging employees are regularly required to show up for work early—or log into their computer system prior to their shift—to ensure all programs, applications and other functions are operating properly. Despite this being a requirement of their job, employees say they are not paid for that time spent preparing for their shift.

Furthermore, they claim some call centers automatically log them off their shift at the end of the shift, even if they are in the middle of a phone call with a customer, which they cannot end. In other words, they are not paid for time spent after their shift, even if their employment rules prevent them from ending a phone call when their shift is done.

In the case of full-time employees, this could mean that they are missing out on overtime pay for time spent on the job before and after their scheduled shifts.

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Last updated on Feb-26-14