AUSTIN, TX – A federal investigation and consent judgment has recovered $170,000 in back wages and liquidated damages from the operator of two Austin-area restaurants who denied overtime to 17 kitchen workers who labored 60 hours a week. The probe found the restaurants’ operator later submitted falsified documents to investigators to make it appear they had paid overtime pay to resolve Fair Labor Standards Act violations found by the U.S. Department of Labor.
The U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas in Austin approved a consent agreement requiring B & G North LLC and Sir Sai Balaji LLC, operator of Biryani N Grill locations in North and South Austin to pay the back wages and damages by Sept. 1, 2021. The parties also agreed to an injunction to prohibit the employer from future violations of FLSA overtime and recordkeeping provisions. The court approved the consent judgment on June 1, 2021.
The financial recovery comes after two investigations by the department’s Wage and Hour Division which found Biryani N Grill paid the kitchen workers a flat salary and initially claimed that, as independent contractors, they were ineligible for overtime. In a subsequent investigation, the employer produced falsified receipt forms to suggest they paid the back wages when they had not, and they failed to correct the pay practices that caused the FLSA violations. The company also failed to keep accurate records as the law requires.
“Restaurant workers provided essential...
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