A Tampa restaurant owed workers $70,000 of back pay after messing with servers’ tips
A Tampa restaurant has paid $70,575 in back pay after a U.S. Department of Labor investigation found violations of federal overtime law and minimum wage law, Labor announced Tuesday.
Brewland Development, owners of Tampa Bay Brewing Company, paid that money to 36 employees, an average of $1,960.42 per worker.
Restaurant servers who receive tips as part of their pay can be paid under federal minimum wage. But, Wage and Hour Division investigators found Brewland, which state records say is operated by Victoria Doble and David Doble, “illegally included managers in the restaurant’s tip sharing arrangement. By doing so, the employer was ineligible to take credit for servers’ tips toward employees’ wages...”
So, those servers should have been paid at least minimum wage.
They also classified a manager as exempt from overtime when he legally couldn’t be classified as exempt. So he didn’t receive overtime pay when he should have.
“The Fair Labor Standards Act permits the employers of certain tipped employees to use those tips as a credit towards the employee’s wages. Employers may use this “tip credit” only if they meet all the legal requirements,” said a statement from Tampa Wage and Hour Division District Director Nicolas Ratmiroff.
Employers who find they’ve committed overtime or minimum wage violations can self-report through the Payroll Audit Independent Determination (PAID) program.
For online information on how to file a complaint, go to the Wage and Hour complaint section of the Department of Labor website. Miami’s Wage and Hour Division office can be reached at 305-598-6607.
