March 18, 2025

Saluti Law Medi

Rule it with System

Federal courtroom orders Portland places to eat to pay $540K to personnel right after illegally splitting recommendations

Federal courtroom orders Portland places to eat to pay 0K to personnel right after illegally splitting recommendations

Employer:              Pizzicato Inc.

                                    121 South Bancroft St.

 Portland, OR 97239                                                                                        

Style of action:          Consent Judgment and Order

Name of defendants: Pizzicato Inc Mark Frankel Tracy Frankel and John-Felix Rippel

Track record: Aninvestigation by the U.S. Office of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division observed 11 eating places running beneath Portland-dependent restaurant chain Pizzicato illegally authorized managers to participate in tip swimming pools and by accomplishing so withheld a part of employees’ earned strategies. Federal legislation prohibits cafe businesses from tipping out managers from a tip pool, together with professionals paid out on an hourly foundation. The investigation also disclosed the employer employed a 17-calendar year-previous minor to generate a motor auto, a violation of the Reasonable Labor Requirements Act’s dangerous occupations for minors.

Resolution: The consent judgment permanently enjoins Pizzicato proprietors Mark and Tracy Frankel and business officer John-Felix Rippel from violating the FLSA and orders the payment of $270,101 in again wages as effectively as $270,101 in liquidated damages, for a whole of $540,202 for 367 workers. The court docket also requested Pizzicato to shell out $29,797 in penalties. 

Court docket: U.S. District Courtroom for the District of Oregon

Rates: “The resolution of this situation should remind restaurant companies that the legislation forbids managers and supervisors to participate in idea-pools and pocket a portion of employees’ guidelines,” mentioned Regional Solicitor of Labor Marc Pilotin in San Francisco. “The U.S. Department of Labor is dedicated to making sure that workers receive all the funds they get paid, which include strategies paid out by consumers.”

“Wage theft, together with employers’ pocketing workers’ tips, is a key worry for cafe field employees, who are some of the most susceptible, very low-wage workers in our neighborhood,” extra Wage and Hour Division District Director Katherine Walum in Portland. 

The division’s Portland district business performed the investigation. The San Francisco Regional Business of the Solicitor reached the consent judgment in courtroom.

Study extra about the Wage and Hour Division, which includes a lookup tool to use if you believe you might be owed again wages collected by the division. You can discover other info on the agency’s web page if you consider you could have been misclassified as an unbiased contractor, or want to know how to file an on-line complaint. For confidential compliance help, staff and businesses can simply call the agency’s toll-free of charge helpline at 866-4US-WAGE (487-9243), irrespective of the place they are from.

Down load the agency’s new Timesheet Application for iOS and Android units – also obtainable in Spanish –to be certain hours and shell out are correct.

Docket Amount: 3:34-cv-00202-SI