A federal judge in California recently gave preliminary approval to a $10 million settlement between Uber and a class of current and former employees who accused the company of, among other things, systematic gender, race, and national origin discrimination in pay and promotion decisions.
The settlement deal approved by the court in del Toro Lopez v. Uber Techs., Inc., No. 4:17-cv-06255 (N.D. Cal.) (preliminary approval of proposed class action settlement granted April 19, 2018), comes just weeks after Family Dollar Stores agreed to resolve a long-running class action involving similar claims for a whopping $45 million in the case of Scott v. Family Dollar Stores, Inc., No. 3:08-cv-00540 (W.D.N.C.) (final approval of settlement agreement granted March 14, 2018).
The plaintiffs in both cases accused the companies of violating Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VII) and the federal Equal Pay Act (EPA) – and in the Uber case, California state law, including its expansive Fair Pay Act. In addition to substantial monetary relief, both settlement agreements call for comprehensive programmatic relief.
These two settlements serve as a graphic reminder that companies – especially larger companies – are attractive targets for class pay discrimination claims, and that plaintiffs’ lawyers (the lawyers in each of these two settlements received one-third of the monetary relief) are eager to take on such cases.
Members of the Center for Workplace Compliance (CWC) can read more here.