Posts Tagged ‘ New York ’

US Open Food Servers Serve up Double Fault Class Action

March 11th, 2010. By AbiK

US Open Food Workers Serve up a Class Action For all the presentation and promotion that attempts to position tennis as a pastime of the hoi polloi, it just can’t seem to get over a bit of an elitist image. It’s not the professional players that make it so—heck, many have come from the hoi polloi themselves and have in their own way given the finger to some of the elitism (recall Agassi’s earlier days…McEnroe’s outbursts…Venus and Serena’s new fashion rules). And this year, you—yes YOU—can even register to compete for a wild card into the US Open Qualifying tournament.

So what gives? Well, if you’re part of the army of food service folks who work the Open, you might be thinking the elitism comes from the country club set who show up at the US Open outfitted in Lacoste or Brooks Brothers toting a casual & sporty—yet appropriate!—Vera Bradley or Lily Pulitzer (LL Bean if quieter propriety’s your thing) bag as they head to their box seats at the Open. See, those food service folks actually work their tails off to serve—as the 2010 US Open site describes it—”innovative menus” that feature “superb cuisine of impeccable quality and freshness” to the social set sitting in the Luxury Suites at Arthur Ashe stadium. Yeah, you’re not seeing that fare if you’re sitting Loge. Luxury Suites, by the way, will set you back $10,000 - $63,000 for a package—hey, parking’s included, catering isn’t (that’s an $1,800 minimum).

Work their tails off? Oh, but surely they make decent money, right? Surely more than the peons working those concession stands outside on the “grounds”?

Well, according to a class action lawsuit filed on March 3rd in Brooklyn federal court, those servers may not be getting paid all that much for the hours they put in serving, as the New York Post calls them “celebrities, trust-fund kids and captains of industry”. The Post quotes one worker who’s also a plaintiff, Daniel Yahraes, as saying he worked more than 100 hours a week and was paid based on his $17 an hour pay rate—no overtime pay (that’s fault #1)—and, while clients were apparently charged an additional 21 percent “service charge”, that fee was not passed along to the “service” (that’s fault #2, and shades of Cipriani?). I have to imagine that some of those workers received cash tips, but still, overtime is overtime and for Yahraes, that would arguably mean he lost out on quite a bit of cash.

Five companies are named in the lawsuit, including Restaurant Associates and the suit covers the past six years.

Tags: Employment, New York, restaurant, Unpaid Overtime, US Open
Posted in Emerging Issues, Employment | No Comments »

A Fair and Just Legal System Also Needs Moderation

October 9th, 2009. By Hunter West

Enough said? Important as it is for citizens to have legal recourse to sue in order to right a wrong, do you sometimes wonder if things are getting a bit out of hand?

Case in point: in 2002 a detective with the New York Police Department (NYPD) accidentally shot himself in the knees while sitting on a chair and trying to holster his revolver. The following year he retired on a three-quarters disability pension and is now employed as a court officer in South Carolina making $24,000 annually.

He also sued the City of New York and last November was awarded $4.5 million in damages by a jury.

For accidentally shooting himself in the knee. For that kind money maybe we should all do that.

Obviously, the former NYPD man found himself a talented lawyer who presumably argued that the revolver, issued by the department, was faulty. As the NYPD is an agent of the City, the Big Apple would be on the hook.

Keep in mind that if we are injured, or victimized in concert with a situation or event through no fault of our own, we should have the right to seek compensation.

Case in point: the scores of women who have unknowingly put themselves in harm’s way by simply subscribing to Yaz birth control. They believed Yaz (and Yasmin) to be a safe and effective oral contraceptive, only to find out the hard way about risks for life-threatening blood clots and thrombosis. Women—painfully young, healthy women—have died.

And then there are the thousands of California workers who are robbed of their right to claim,

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: California Overtime, lawsuits, New York, Yasmin, Yaz
Posted in Court of Public Opinion | No Comments »

Posts Tagged ‘ New York ’

US Open Food Servers Serve up Double Fault Class Action

March 11th, 2010. By AbiK

A Fair and Just Legal System Also Needs Moderation

October 9th, 2009. By Hunter West

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