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An employee in Florida filed a lawsuit for unpaid overtime and for retaliation based on her complaint on Facebook that her employer was not paying overtime. This decision falls on the heals of the Supreme Court’s decision in Kasten v. Saint-Gobain Perf. Plastics Corp. In Kasten, the Supreme Court ruled that an oral complaint by an employee of a violation of the federal wage and hour laws (known as the Fair Labor Standards act “FLSA”) is sufficient to support a claim for retaliation in violation of the FLSA. The FLSA prohibits retaliation for “filing a complaint” of a violation of the wage and hour laws. The Supreme Court determined that “filing a complaint” can be done orally and is not required to be in writing.
The Court rejected the employee’s retaliation claim finding that the employee did “not allege that she made anything close to a serious complaint to her employer. In fact, she never complained to her employer at all. She simply voiced her disagreement with her employer’s payment practices on her Facebook page.” See Morse v. JP Morgan Chase & Co., Middle District, Florida.
July 21, 2011 – Tom McKinney – Castronovo & McKinney, LLC