Forester Haynie Files Class-Action Against Allied Universal

Forester Haynie and Shellist | Lazarz | Slobin recently filed an FLSA collective and class-action lawsuit against Universal Protection Service, A.K.A. Allied Universal Security Services on behalf of security guards that work or have worked for Allied Universal. Allied Universal is a security and facility services company that provides security personnel to a variety of locations across the country.

Failed To Pay Overtime

The lawsuit alleges that Allied Universal’s security guard employees are, or were hourly-paid, non-exempt employees, who worked at Allied Universal’s customers’ sites providing security services including patrolling, monitoring, and reporting suspicious activity. The lawsuit states that these security guards frequently earned either minimum wage or slightly more than minimum wage and often had to work over forty hours a week and thus were eligible to receive overtime wages.

Preceding the initiation of the legal action, Allied Universal had employed a payroll platform referred to as Kronos from UKG, which subsequently suffered from a ransomware breach that had an impact on the Kronos Private Cloud (KPC). The KPC is the platform that hosts various UKG solutions such as UKG Workforce Central, UKG TeleStaff, Healthcare Extensions, and Banking Scheduling.

For reasons yet unknown, Allied Universal neglected to undertake essential measures to effectively record the working hours of their employees and compensate them for overtime wages already merited. Instead of taking precautionary action for their employees, Allied Universal also failed to account for some of the workers’ time and began to base the wages on prior periods or “reduced payroll estimates.”

The complaint alleges that Allied Universal’s policies with regard to these security guards violated the FLSA and state law. According to our clients and the lawsuit, Allied Universal allegedly often requires its security guard employees to perform uncompensated work “off-the-clock” before and after their scheduled shifts in violation of the FLSA. The complaint also alleges that these security guards are not allowed to take their meal and rest breaks as required by Colorado and California state law.

Suing Your Employer For Unpaid Wages in California

In the event that an employer has breached California’s wage and hour laws, affected employees may have the opportunity to seek recourse for any unpaid wages through filing a complaint with the labor board or initiating a wage and hour lawsuit against their employer. Potential lawsuits pertaining to overtime violations in California may entail:

• Failed to pay overtime wages for work over 8 hours in a day
• Failed to pay overtime wages for work over 40 hours in a week
• Not paying overtime for working more than six consecutive days
• Forcing employees to work off the clock
• Requiring employees to work during an unpaid meal break or rest break
• Misclassifying workers are “exempt” or “independent contractors”

If you have ever been a security guard employee of Allied Universal and would like to assist our firms’ investigation into Allied Universal or want more information about the case, then please fill out the form below to speak with one of our attorneys.

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