Dollar General Denied Employees Accommodations for Lactation Breaks, Lawsuit Claims

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Two former Dollar General employees claim in a proposed collective action that they were not provided sufficient break times or accommodations to pump breastmilk during shifts.

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The 35-page lawsuit says that the retailer has run afoul of the federal Providing Urgent Maternal Protections for Nursing Mothers Act (the PUMP Act), which went into effect in April 2023 and extended the protections provided by the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) with respect to nursing accommodations for employees.

The suit contends that despite its obligations under the FLSA and PUMP Act, Dollar General has repeatedly refused to provide employees who are nursing adequate break times and a private, functional space in which to express breastmilk during shifts.

According to guidelines published by the U.S. Department of Labor Wage and Hour Division in May of this year, a worker is entitled to a “reasonable break,” which cannot be denied by the employer, each time they need to pump at work for one year after their baby is born, the case relays. In addition, the guidelines stipulate that employers must provide nursing workers with a private space to pump that is shielded from view, at no risk of intrusion and, crucially, not a bathroom, the complaint says.

Dollar General’s failure to provide proper time and space to nursing employees is a “systemic issue” that has affected workers nationwide, the filing charges. Although a sufficient lactation space is critical for a mother to be able to pump comfortably and effectively, Dollar General employees are “forced to pump breast milk in unsanitary stockrooms, bathrooms, or their private vehicles” because of the company’s practices, the lawsuit shares.

As the suit tells it, lacking a comfortable, secure place to pump can have an adverse impact on a mother’s physical, mental and emotional well-being.

Complying with the PUMP Act would be “relatively easy” for Dollar General, the case states. Numerous companies, such as Mamava, Brighter Booth and DayOne Baby, sell portable lactation pods that are temporary, easily assembled and affordable, the complaint relays. Alternatively, Dollar General could satisfy its obligations under federal law by allowing nursing employees access to clean offices and installing locks on the doors, the filing adds.

“Thus, while there are many ways to accommodate breastfeeding employees, Dollar General has simply decided to not provide such accommodations,” the lawsuit claims.

One plaintiff, a Florida mother whose child was born a month before she started work at Dollar General, says she was forced to pump in her vehicle after her manager offered the stockroom as an alternative. When it got too hot to pump in her car, the woman had to use the stockroom, though it did not have a lock and was generally “dusty and unsanitary,” the suit shares.

The other plaintiff, a New York resident, claims she was told to pump in the bathroom when she returned to work after having a baby. The woman says she felt “dehumanized and humiliated” and “embarrassed each time she had to leave the bathroom holding her pumping equipment.”

The case further describes that the plaintiff pumped in the bathroom for more than a month before abandoning pumping completely due to staff shortages that prevented her from taking breaks.

“Instead of supporting breastfeeding mothers, Dollar General’s practices forced those mothers into a Hobson’s choice between using demeaning, unsanitary spaces to express milk, abandoning pumping at work altogether, or quitting their jobs,” the complaint contends. “Congress clearly declared in the PUMP Act that no mother should have to make such a choice.”

The lawsuit looks to represent any current or former non-executive employees of Dollar General who are or were lactating at any time since December 29, 2022 and who, upon request, were denied reasonable break times to pump breastmilk in the year following their child’s birth or were denied a sanitary “functional space”—i.e., one that is shielded from view, free from intrusion, available when needed and not a bathroom—to express breastmilk.

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