19 AT&T workers sue for overtime
Nineteen AT&T employees who worked in a San Antonio call center have sued the company for unpaid overtime, alleging they were permitted or required to work “off the clock.”
The allegations were made in three lawsuits, filed Saturday in San Antonio federal court, against AT&T Services Inc. and Southwestern Bell Telephone LP.
AT&T spokesman Jim Kimberly in an email disputed the allegations, saying the telecommunications company complies with wage and hour laws.
The plaintiffs worked in the eight-story AT&T building at 4119 Broadway. It's not clear if any still work there. AT&T continues to operate a call center in the building, which the University of the Incarnate Word acquired last fall.
No move-out date has been determined for AT&T, university spokeswoman Margaret L. Garcia said in an email.
The university intends to move into the building in phases over several years, starting as early as next spring.
The telecommunications giant moved its headquarters from San Antonio to Dallas more than decade ago.
At least a dozen of the 19 plaintiffs in the complaints were part of a class-action lawsuit in Dallas against AT&T Services. The suit's class-action status was decertified two months ago by a federal judge.
The parties in the litigation last year had agreed to conditionally certify the class, which involved 285 current and former hourly employees who worked in five call centers.
Besides San Antonio, the action involved now-shuttered centers in Houston, Dallas, Fort Worth and Kansas City.
In September, AT&T filed a motion to decertify the complaint. Kimberly didn't address the reason for AT&T reversing its position on the certification.
AT&T argued in a court filing that litigating all of the class claims “will inevitably deteriorate into hundreds of mini-trials that are neither manageable for the Court nor fair to AT&T Services.”
The plaintiffs didn't oppose the decertification, saying they “instead intend to pursue each of their claims for weekly and daily unpaid overtime in individual actions, or in small groups of less than 10 employees.”
In addition to the San Antonio lawsuits, four complaints involving about 30 plaintiffs were filed last week in Dallas federal court.
J. Derek Braziel, a Dallas lawyer for the plaintiffs, didn't respond to a request for comment.
According to the AT&T court filing, the call-center workers — known as revenue management representatives — primarily handled incoming calls from customers with billing and collection issues.
One of the San Antonio lawsuits alleges workers regularly performed work before the start of their scheduled shift, after their shift ended and during unpaid meal breaks.
The workers estimate they each worked one or more hours each week of unpaid overtime. The lawsuit didn't specify when that occurred.
Customer calls typically last 5 to 30 minutes, and workers can still be on a call when they reach the end of their scheduled shift. AT&T prohibits workers from disconnecting before the call is completed, even if it extends beyond the end of their shift, the suit says. Follow-up work on calls often is required.
How closely employees adhered to their scheduled work hours affected their performance evaluations, though, the suit adds.
“If a call center associate reports incidental overtime or trade
time — a/k/a time worked outside their scheduled shift hours — that reporting negatively impacts their overall job performance review and can lead to their losing the opportunity to apply for obtain higher-paying evening hours schedules, job transfer requests, and can even lead to termination of employment,” the suit says.
AT&T said in its September court filing that it recognizes calls can run past scheduled shifts and into lunch breaks. For that reason, it said it established a “robust process to account for such incidental time.”
“AT&T Services' clearly articulated policy is that employees are to report and will be paid for all time worked, including any incidental time worked outside their scheduled shift,” it said in the filing.
It's up to workers to report the extra time they worked, AT&T says. In fact, it says they did so on many occasions.
“Plaintiffs' claimed injury that they were not paid for instances when they allegedly worked outside their schedule but for some reason (often purely personal) did not report the time,” the company alleges.
The workers are suing under the federal Fair Labors Standards Act. The suits don't specify how much they are seeking in damages. is