A federal court ordered Sunoco gas station in Beaver County, Pennsylvania, to pay over $281,000 in back wages and liquidated damages for failing to pay two employees properly.
The U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania entered a consent judgment on Nov. 5 requiring the employers of the station, Durlabhju and Bhartiben Ukani, to pay up and stop violating the Fair Labor Standards Act.
The two failed to pay the minimum $7.25 hourly wage to two employees and did not pay them overtime when they worked more than 40 hours a week, according to a Labor Department press release.
“Monaca Sunoco stole wages from these workers, harming them and their family and cheating employers who play by the rules,” said Regional Solicitor Oscar Hampton III in Philadelphia. “This judgment sends a clear message to employers that failure to pay employees their rightfully earned wages comes at a high cost.”
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Investigators determined one employee would work 70 hours a week, often without pay, while her husband worked additional unpaid hours after his scheduled shift ended. The employers had no records of the wife’s work hours from November 2018 to April 2021, and the limited records they did provide showed start and end times without daily or weekly totals, according to the Labor Department.
The court ordered the employers to pay a $1,762 civil money penalty, which the department assessed due to the willfulness of the employer’s violations, the press release added.
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An employee who worked at the gas station told the Washington Examiner she did not know anything about the fines her employers faced.
