On April 6, 2012, Rowdy Meeks Legal Group LLC sued NHS Management, LLC and Northport Health Services of Missouri, LLC d/b/a Carthage Health and Rehabilitation Center (“NHS”), and its forty-one (41) nursing home facilities in Missouri, Arkansas, Alabama, and Florida, for automatically deducting lunch time from employees’ paychecks, not paying employees for all work time, and unlawfully rounding away employees’ work time. The lawsuit is Tina M. Hamilton et al v. NHS Management, LLC et al, Case No. 3:12-cv-05044-RED, filed in Federal Court, Western District of Missouri, in Joplin, Missouri.
The lawsuit alleges that NHS’s failure to pay hourly employees for all time worked including overtime violated the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and state wage and common laws. The lawsuit is filed as a collective class action which means that other hourly employees at Northport Health Services 41 facilities nationwide may be eligible to join the lawsuit to recover their unpaid wages.
These facilities include:
Northport Health Services of Missouri, LLC
Carthage Health and Rehabilitation Center
Joplin Health and Rehabilitation Center
Webb City Health and Rehabilitation Center
Warsaw Health and Rehabilitation Center
Pleasant Hill Health and Rehabilitation Center
Northport Health Services of Arkansas, LLC
Springdale Health and Rehabilitation Center
Fayetteville Health and Rehabilitation Center
Legacy Health and Rehabilitation Center (Ft. Smith)
Covington Court Health and Rehabilitation Center (Ft. Smith)
Paris Health and Rehabilitation Center
Northport Health Service of Florida, LLC
St. Augustine Health and Rehabilitation Center
Daytona Beach Health and Rehabilitation Center
Ocala Health and Rehabilitation Center
Crystal River Health and Rehabilitation Center
West Melbourne Health and Rehabilitation Center
Northport Health Services Facilities in Alabama
Valley View Health and Rehabilitation (Madison)
Hendrix Health and Rehabilitation Center (Double Springs)
Crossville Health and Rehabilitation Center
Jacksonville Health and Rehabilitation Center
Cordova Health and Rehabilitation Center
Civic Center Health and Rehabilitation Center (Birmingham)
South Health and Rehabilitation Center (Birmingham)
Oak Knoll Health and Rehabilitation Center (Birmingham)
Northway Health and Rehabilitation Center (Birmingham)
South Haven Health and Rehabilitation Center (Birmingham)
Legacy Health and Rehabilitation Center of Pleasant Grove (Birmingham)
Glen Haven Health and Rehabilitation Center (Northport)
Park Manor Health and Rehabilitation Center (Northport)
Northport Health and Rehabilitation Center
Lineville Health and Rehabilitation Center
Moundville Health and Rehabilitation Center
Columbiana Health and Rehabilitation Center
Sumter Health and Rehabilitation Center (York)
Prattville Health and Rehabilitation Center
Wetumpka Health and Rehabilitation Center
Tallassee Health and Rehabilitation Center
Luverne Health and Rehabilitation Center
Georgiana Health and Rehabilitation Center
Ozark Health and Rehabilitation Center
Opp Health and Rehabilitation Center
Florala Health and Rehabilitation Center
The lawsuit alleges that NHS automatically deducted 30 minutes from hourly employees’ paychecks for lunch time whether or not the employees received a lunch break. The lawsuit further alleges that NHS forced employees to work off the clock without payment and rounded work time away to the employees’ detriment – both of which shorted employees wages they earned.
NHS may have impacted more than 2,000 hourly employees by its allegedly illegal wage policies and practices.