Unpaid or Underpaid Wages, Overtime Wages, Prevailing Wages, Union Wages, Retaliation by Employer

Wages/overtime wages:

• not getting paid for every hour worked
• not getting paid overtime for work over forty (40) hours
• being paid “straight”, per day or per week instead of hourly
• not being paid for travel time or waiting time
• off-the-clock work
• getting paid less than other employees because of age or gender

Tip-sharing violations by restaurants and other service providers:

• including managers and other non-server employees in the tip-pool
• stealing servers’ tips by managers or the establishment
• stealing tips by classifying gratuity as a “service fee”

Misclassification of employees to avoid payment for all hours worked or overtime:

• as servers and bussers who in fact perform non-server work in restaurants
• as superintendents in residential buildings
• as managers or professionals
• as independent contractors
• as unpaid interns or students

Failure to pay prevailing wages on city, state and federal projects:

• work on the Davis-Bacon Act projects or other public works
• getting paid regular wages instead of prevailing wages
• misclassification of trade on prevailing wage jobs
• having to split pay with, or to pay kickbacks to, the bosses or managers

Failure to pay union wages:

• The owner uses non-union company to perform union jobs and does not pay union scale wages
• You were prevented from joining the union while working on an union job
• The union is conducting an unending “investigation” of, or refuses to investigate, your complaint regarding failure to pay union wages

Unlawful deductions from your paycheck

Failure to pay for sick time under the New York City law

Wage notice and paystub violations by employers

Retaliation against an employee (reduced pay or benefits, demotion, transfer to less desirable locations, tendentious negative evaluations, termination) for:

• seeking a raise or complaining about wage payment issues
• complaining against discrimination of oneself or others
• reporting unsafe or dangerous work conditions
• reporting unsafe or dangerous conditions to the public
• reporting tax fraud and health care fraud
• partaking in an investigation or testifying on behalf of other employees who lodged complaints against the employer for violations of wage and hour or discrimination laws

IMPORTANT:

In New York, you may recover unpaid wages for up to six (6) years (in other states and under the federal law for up to three (3) years) from the date these wages were due. So, with every passing payday, you may be losing the ability to recover the wages that are due you.

You may recover unpaid wages and other damages even if:

• you have no work permit or a green card
• you do not have copies of the paychecks you received you were paid in cash
• you were forced to pay kickbacks to keep your job
• the owner closed the business or the business declared bankruptcy