Wage and Hour Division (WHD)

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WHITE PLAINS, N.Y -- Two Hudson Valley, N.Y., corporations, doing business as Hurtig-Evans Home Care Services, and their officers have agreed to pay 99 employees a total of $163,457 in overtime back wages and interest to resolve a lawsuit by the U.S. Department of Labor alleging violations of the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA).

The suit was filed in April in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York and named as defendants Hurtig-Evans International Inc. and HEI Inc., as well as Phillip K.C. Casimir and Anisha Kiran Casimir. The suit followed an investigation by the Labor Department’s Wage and Hour Division that disclosed violations of the FLSA’s overtime pay provisions.

The FLSA requires that covered employees be paid at least the federal minimum wage as well as one and one-half times their regular rates of pay for hours worked beyond 40 per week. The law also requires that accurate records of employees’ wages, hours and other conditions of employment be maintained.

“It’s unfortunate when employers fail in their responsibility to pay employees properly for all the hours that they work,” said Sonia Rybak, assistant district director for the Wage and Hour Division in White Plains. “This case demonstrates that the Labor Department will not hesitate to resort to litigation to enforce the law and recover back wages for low-wage workers.”

A consent judgment signed by Judge Charles L. Brieant prohibits the defendants from future violations of the FLSA’s overtime provisions and orders them to pay employees a total of $157,929 in overtime back wages and $5,528 in interest. If the defendants fail to make any of the back wage payments, the court will appoint a receiver with power to seize and liquidate their assets to satisfy the back wage payment order.

The Wage and Hour Division concluded 31,987 compliance actions and recovered more than $171 million in back wages for more than 246,000 employees in fiscal year 2006. Back-wage collections last year represent a 30 percent increase over back wages collected in fiscal 2001. The number of workers receiving back wages has increased by 14 percent since fiscal 2001.

For more information about the FLSA, call the Department of Labor’s toll-free helpline at (866) 4US-WAGE (487-9243). Information is also available on the Internet at www.wagehour.dol.gov, and an interactive “e-laws advisor” providing detailed information about FLSA compliance is available atwww.dol.gov/elaws/flsa.htm.

Chao v. Hurtig-Evans International Inc. et al; Civil Action Number: 07-CV-3332

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