Employee makes claims for wage, overtime, meal break and other Labor Code violations

In Iskanian v. CLS Transportation Los Angeles, LLC (2014), the California Supreme Court said that an employee’s right to sue under the Private Attorneys General Act (PAGA) was unwaivable and that the rule against such waivers did not frustrate the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA)’s objectives.

In Wing v. Chico Healthcare & Wellness Centre, Chico Healthcare & Wellness Centre, LP hired a receptionist at a skilled nursing facility. She agreed, as an employment condition, to be bound by the company’s alternative dispute resolution (ADR) policy.

The ADR policy required employees and the employer to exclusively resolve covered disputes between them via final and binding arbitration and included a waiver of class actions or of actions as a private attorney general or as a representative of others.

In June 2018, the employee provided notice to the Labor and Workforce Development Agency, as required by the law, of alleged Labor Code violations by her employer. In August 2018, she filed a complaint. She made class claims and PAGA representative claims for wage, overtime, meal break, and other Labor Code violations.

The employer, citing the ADR policy, sought arbitration of the employee’s individual claims and asked the court to strike the class claims and to stay the PAGA claims pending the arbitration’s outcome. The employee refused and instead amended her complaint to delete the class claims....

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