What's This Lawsuit All About?
On December 11, 2006, STEPAN MEKHITARIAN filed a lawsuit against Deloitte & Touche LLP and Deloitte Tax LLP (D&T), on behalf of himself and all others similarly situated - in other words, a CLASS ACTION lawsuit. Mr. Mekhitarian's lawsuit challenges D&T's practice of forcing some of its "salaried" employees (TAX ASSOCIATES and TAX SENIORS) to work in excess of 8 hours per day or 40 hours per week without overtime compensation. The suit alleges that D&T improperly classified its Tax Associates and Tax Seniors as "exempt" employees in order to avoid paying statutory overtime. Per California's Industrial Welfare Commission, Wage Order No. 4-2001 , “Professional, Technical, Clerical, Mechanical and Similar Occupations” (Wage Order), employees who do not function primarily in an administrative, executive or professional capacity (as those terms are defined by the Wage Order) are NOT EXEMPT and MUST BE PAID for any OVERTIME worked.
Stepan's complaint states, "Although [Deloitte & Touche] should have compensated [the] Tax Associates and Tax Seniors at the rate of one and one-half (1½) times their regular hourly wage for all hours worked in excess of eight (8) hours per workday or forty (40) hours per workweek and double their regular hourly wage for all hours worked in excess of twelve (12) hours per workday or in excess of eight (8) hours on the seventh workday of the week during the alleged statutory periods, they were instead compensated by a straight annual salary, regardless of the number of hours worked." Mr. Mekhitarian believes that there are hundreds of current and former D&T employees who, like himself, were paid a straight "salary" even though they worked hundreds of hours of overtime. He believes that each person in that situation is entitled to $25,000 or more in overtime pay.
There currently is no pending class certification motion before the Court. However, it is anticipated that a class certification motion will be filed within the next three (3) months. To be able to further investigate his claim on behalf of the class members, Stepan is asking you to help him and yourself by completing the online questionnaire here on this site. Although you are not at all required to do this, your completion of the online questionnaire will do two things: 1) it will identify you as a potential member of the class, and 2) it will help us investigate and determine the extent of these alleged unlawful and unfair practices for the Court's consideration.
If this is all sounding very familiar to you, chances are excellent that you may be a member of the class and we would really like to hear from you as soon as possible. And to put your mind as ease, REMEMBER it is against the law for D&T to retaliate against any current or former employees who complete these online forms, join the class, or exercise their legal rights with regard to the practice of unpaid overtime. Do yourself and the "class" a favor by completing the short questionnaire today and help SPREAD THE WORD to anyone else you know who is similarly situated. If you would prefer to fill out and mail a hard copy of the questionnaire to our office, please email us and we will send you a PDF.
