High court to look at server pay

State’s top jurists take up Chip’s Family Restaurants case

HARTFORD — The Connecticut Supreme Court may have to decide whether refilling pancake syrup containers is a minimumwage job, or part of the lesserpaid role of meal servers, who earn much of their pay from customer tips.

In a case involving employees of the Chip’s Family Restaurants chain who want to pursue a class-action case against the owners, Jeffrey J. White, a lawyer representing Kaiaffa LLC and George Chatzopoulos, the regional diners’ owners, said that it’s hard to keep track of the time servers spend between waiting on tables, when they earn below the minimum wage, and other duties where they must be paid at the higher rate, which is now $11 an hour.

“Isn’t the issue here whether you are violating the Department of Labor Law?” asked Associate Justice Maria Araujo Kahn, to White. “If you don’t keep track of non-food-service activity you have to pay the employee the full hourly rate. Isn’t that true?”

During an hour-long hearing, veteran labor attorney Richard E. Hayber, representing a former employee of Chip’s diner in Wethersfield and as many as 300 other workers for the restaurant chain, told the seven-jurist panel that until only the last two months, Chip’s did not keep track of the amount of time its employees split between serving tables and performing the ancillary, but higher-paid tasks.

Under the state’s so-called tipcredit law, servers get paid $6.38 for the hours spent waiting tables, but other jobs, usually cleaning and stocking, are subject to the minimum wage, which rose to $11 from $10.10 on Oct. 1.

Jacqueline Rodriquez, the plaintiff, won a partial victory at the Superior Court level, granting her and other employees class-action status. But the owners want the case returned to the lower court, charging that the judge there erred. Rodriquez charged that the side work routinely expected of restaurant employees was paid at the lower rate.

“My question is: does the law say that if you don’t keep track, you have to pay for all the work at the higher rate?” Kahn asked White. “I would say that, again, the trial court needed to address this,” White replied.

The chain owns restaurants in Fairfield, Orange, Southbury, Wethersfield and Southington. Its Trumbull location recently closed because of a parking issue and the owners are looking for a new location.

White used a hypothetical involving the several varieties of pancake syrup, offering a scenario in which when customers leave a table, the servers are required to bring the syrup containers to a dishwasher, then return the cleaned vessels when new customers sit down.

“We offer the interpretation that this action is incidental to service,” White said. In all there are 35 different tasks for Chip’s employees, above and beyond serving food and taking orders.

Hayber said that restaurant employees are regularly victimized by employers. He called them “the most vulnerable people in our economy.” The owner’s argument is typical, he said. “Their theory is it doesn’t matter because this is what servers do. Service occurs at the table, not the kitchen.”

kdixon@ctpost.com Twitter: @KenDixonCT