Textile Company Pays Overtime Wages to Employees
After an investigation by the U.S. Department of Labor, Dahdoul Textiles has paid 57 current and former employees $260,000 for back overtime wages plus damages.
Last June, labor investigators went to Dahdoul Textiles, a home-furnishings company with a store at 1049 S. Los Angeles St. in Los Angeles and a warehouse at 7200 Bandini Blvd. in Commerce, Calif., to examine payroll books and interview employees and the owners.
“Once we completed the investigation, we discussed our findings with the employer to try to reach a settlement,” said Kimchi Bui, director of the U.S. Labor Department’s Wage and Hour Division’s Los Angeles district office. “In this case, we resolved it through litigation.”
A lawsuit was filed in November in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles to retrieve $130,000 in unpaid overtime wages. A consent decree issued by the judge mandated that Dahdoul pay the back overtime wages as well as an additional $130,000 in liquidated damages to the employees. The overtime wages were paid for time worked between June 8, 2009, and June 8, 2012.
Dahdoul Textiles—owned by Ali Dahdoul, Imad Dahdoul and Ahmad Dahdoul—also had to pay a $10,000 fine.
The investigation found that employees were paid straight time for all hours worked and did not receive overtime for hours worked beyond 40 hours a week, as required by the Fair Labor Standards Act. The federal minimum wage is $7.25 an hour, and the California minimum wage is $8 an hour.
Dahdoul Textiles also maintained two separate timekeeping systems to conceal employees’ work hours, federal labor officials said.
“The fact that we were able to recover double the original wages owed to the workers serves as a warning to employers who try to skirt the law that they may face serious financial consequences,” Bui said.
—Deborah Belgum
