Two federal agencies with significant authority over private-sector workplace enforcement — the Department of Labor (DOL) and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) — recently agreed to pay large sums of money to their own employees to settle failure to pay overtime claims. The settlements represent a classic case of “do as we say, not as we do.”
In one settlement, DOL agreed to pay $7 million to settle claims that it failed to pay required overtime to an undisclosed number of employees and former employees. In the other settlement, the EEOC agreed to pay $1.53 million, and provide more than 6,000 hours of time off, to settle similar claims brought by more than 250 current and former employees.
In each case, the settlement was entered into with a unit of the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), a labor union that primarily represents federal employees.
Members of the Equal Employment Advisory Council (EEAC) can read more here.