Payala claims many other employees discriminated too.
By Raif Karerat
WASHINGTON, DC: In a class action lawsuit filed with the Superior Court of California, County of Los Angeles, Indian national Suri Payala is claiming Wipro Ltd. — a multinational information technology consulting firm based out of Bengaluru — failed to compensate him and other employees for numerous overtime hours logged while working under the company’s corporate umbrella.
The lawsuit alleges that “Wipro’s business model is extremely profitable, in no small part because it does not pay its employees overtime for work in excess of 40 hours per week as required by California law.”
Many of the employees are citizens of foreign countries who come to the United States under L-1B visas processed by Wipro and are not aware of their rights under California’s wage and hour laws, the case continues.
Payala further alleges Wipro intentionally misclassifies employees who provide computer support, troubleshooting, testing related to repairs, and technical services as exempt from overtime pay. However, according to California statutes, such employees are not exempt if they earn less than an annual salary of $84,130 as of January 2014.
For the first six months of 2014, Payala was employed by Wipro as a computer technician with the title of Architect, and was outsourced to DirecTV in California. The lawsuit states he was not paid overtime and was not paid for his travel time to the outsourced job site, despite earning a salary of less than $7,000 per month, which is in violation of state wage and hour laws.
Payala’s class action lawsuit seeks to represent any employees who provided computer support, troubleshooting, testing related to repairs, and technical services over the past four years prior to the filing on March 30 who received compensation less than $7,000 per month and who were categorized as exempt employees.
The causes of action are explicitly noted as unlawful failure to pay all overtime and double time wages, failure to furnish timely and accurate wage statements, failure to pay all wages owed every pay period, violation of California’s Unfair Competition Act, and finally, failure to pay all wages due at separation.
The American Bazaar made an inquiry with Wipro’s Washington D.C. office regarding the class-action litigation, but did not hear back.
2 Comments
Google ‘wipro sniping’ and see how unethical Wipro is. Or read this http://www.consumermotion.com/product/wipro-p30181.html
Good that person like suri payala has understood the laws and raised the flag for all such employees who are working like him.