Lawsuit Against Pizza Hut Restaurants Moves Forward

A lawsuit against an operator of 1,260 Pizza Hut restaurants in twenty-eight states was given the green light by a federal court judge in Tennessee. The lawsuit claims that Pizza Hut restaurants operated by NPC International, Inc. violated the Fair Labor Standards Act by requiring servers to (1) undergo training and attend meetings while not clocked in; (2) perform "unrelated non-tip producing work" at "sub-minimum hourly wages"; (3) perform "side work" in excess of twenty percent of their time while clocked in as tipped employees at sub-minimum pay; and (4) falsely report tips they did not receive so as to reduce the amount of supplemental compensation the restaurant had to pay in order to meet the federal minimum wage. The Pizza Hut workers allege that they were required to perform excessive side work while clocked in as tipped employees and that they worked off the clock, including attending monthly meetings and receiving mandatory training. Some workers claim they performed other duties, such as food preparation, customer service work, and cleaning while clocked in as tipped employees and that they were instructed to over-report tips to satisfy NPC's tips credit requirement. These workers claim that, as a result of Pizza Hut’s goal of reducing labor costs, they were required to work off the clock, perform non-tipped work while clocked in as tipped employees, and over-report tips. Judge Breen granted certification of a collective action and ordered that NPC produce the names of and send notice to all current and former tipped employees who were subjected to Pizza Hut’s alleged illegal policies at any time during the previous three years.