A Honolulu-based security services company has been ordered to pay more than $1.5 million in back wages and fees following an investigation by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division.
The department said this week that the Honolulu-based Alii Security Systems Inc. will pay nearly $1.45 million in back wages and liquidated damages to 171 guards, along with $60,000 in civil penalties, after investigators found that the company denied employees overtime pay.
Alii Security Systems provides security officers for a range of both public and private facilities on Oahu.
In a release, the Department of Labor said that it found the company “established a ‘voluntary program’ that offered guards more work hours if they waived their right to overtime and accepted straight-time pay for all hours worked.” The department said that its investigation found that the company “intentionally violated” federal labor laws on overtime pay.
“Employers who attempt to evade their legal responsibility to pay workers all of their rightfully earned wages will face costly consequences,” said Jessica Looman, acting administrator of the Wage and Hour Division, in a statement. “Alii Security Systems Inc. devised a scheme that denied overtime to guards who worked more than 40 hours in a workweek, cheated other guards out of a fair share of work hours, and gained an unfair competitive advantage over others in their industry that abide by the law.”
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