Healthcare Worker Unpaid Wage Claims

Wage & Hour Violations in the Healthcare Industry

Hospitals, medical institutions, and other healthcare employers know that all workers must be provided a fair wage. Otherwise, the company or corporation could face heavy legal penalties. As such, a healthcare employer that tries to short the wages and benefits of its workers will take great strides to conceal those efforts, which makes it all the more difficult for workers to notice that anything is wrong at first.

Our healthcare worker unpaid wage claim lawyers from Josephson Dunlap can make sense of your situation, no matter how complicated it became due to your employer’s actions to short your pay. Even if your employer did not intentionally commit wage violations, you could still have a valid claim or lawsuit to bring against it.

Different methods that employers use to short hours, wages, and benefits can include:

• Time-shaving: Time-shaving is an unethical and illegal employment practice in which employers intentionally manipulate or alter employees' time records to reduce their payable working hours. This deceitful act typically involves rounding down the employees' clock-in and clock-out times, omitting overtime hours, or deleting portions of recorded work time. As a result, employees are deprived of their rightful earnings. Time-shaving violates labor laws and regulations, such as the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) in the United States.
• Meal and rest break violations: Meal and rest break violations occur when employers fail to provide their employees with legally mandated breaks during their workday, as stipulated by labor laws and regulations in various jurisdictions. These violations can take several forms, including denying employees their entitled breaks, requiring employees to work through their breaks, or providing insufficient break durations.
• Off-the-clock work: Mandatory off-the-clock work is an unlawful employment practice in which employers require or pressure their employees to perform job duties outside of their regular working hours without providing proper compensation. Off-the-clock work violations are a particularly common problem in the healthcare industry, where employees often need to react quickly to patient emergencies. Employers must ensure that a worker is paid for any medical care they provide while technically not on the clock. 
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Overtime Pay Violations in Healthcare

Overtime pay is another gray area in the healthcare industry that can be taken advantage of by a dishonest healthcare employer. Like most other workers, many workers in the healthcare industry are eligible to receive overtime pay in some circumstances. However, calculating overtime pay in the healthcare industry can become difficult due to complications unique to that industry. This difficulty in calculating overtime pay accurately can make it easier for an employer to find ways to short overtime pay unlawfully without the affected worker noticing.

Overtime pay complications in the healthcare industry can include:

• Shift differentials: When an employee works outside their typical schedule, they can be eligible for shift differential pay to compensate them for the inconvenience. Shift differential pay is common in healthcare, especially among nurses. Overtime pay must factor in shift differential pay, which adds a complication to the process.
• Hazard pay: Many hospital workers may be eligible for hazard pay due to the risk of injury and illness that is inherent in their jobs. When you worked overtime, did it calculate your hazard pay as a healthcare worker? If not, you could have a wage violation claim to file.
• Bonuses: Special bonuses can be earned by healthcare workers, depending on their job titles and duties. In some cases, the bonus pay can be affected by overtime pay. Our attorneys can review your employment contract to see if you should be paid additional overtime due to a special bonus option.