Lawsuit Alleges H.P. Services Owes Unpaid Overtime to Hurricane-Relief Workers in Puerto Rico, Virgin Islands

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A proposed class and collective action claims subcontractor H.P. Services, Corp. has failed to properly compensate workers staffed with money provided by the federal government for clean-up and restoration efforts in the wake of Hurricanes Irma and Maria. 

The plaintiff, who the 18-page suit says delivered generators and heavy equipment to H.P. Services’ work sites in the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico, claims he and other workers were deprived of overtime pay when they received a day rate in place of hourly wages. In instances when the workers were paid hourly, the defendant failed to properly calculate their wage rates by failing to account for all pay received, thereby also depriving the workers of appropriate overtime, the case alleges. 

According to the complaint, H.P. Services was a subcontractor for Louis Berger, who after a U.S. Department of Labor, Wage and Hour Division, investigation was on the hook for more than $5.5 million owed to the employees of nine subcontractors who provided power generator operation support in Puerto Rico. The lawsuit alleges H.P. Services improperly classified the plaintiff and similarly situated workers as independent contractors, and not as bona fide employees subject to statutory wage and hour protections. More than 30 other H.P. Services workers have opted to join the plaintiff in alleging they’re owed unpaid overtime wages, the lawsuit relays. 

“[The plaintiff] customarily worked 12 or more hours a day, and consistently worked over 60 hours a week,” the suit claims. “He was not paid overtime for hours worked over 40 in a workweek.”

In the wake of the devastation caused by Hurricanes Irma and Maria, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, U.S. Postal Services and Defense Logistics Agency launched efforts to provide aid and repairs to Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, the lawsuit relays. As part of these efforts, Louis Berger, a prime contractor, was awarded multiple contracts for power generation and repair, and more than 300 staff and independent contractors were on the ground to aid the government, the complaint says. 

Puerto Rico-based H.P. Services, one of nine subcontractors at the center of the DOL investigation into apparent wage and hour violations, provided delivery, repairs, service and maintenance on generators used as part of the storm recovery efforts, according to the case. For this work, however, the plaintiff and similarly situated individuals were misclassified as independent contractors and paid a flat sum for each day regardless of the number of hours they worked, the lawsuit alleges. The workers, per the suit, were deprived of proper overtime pay for hours worked in excess of 40 each week. 

Another method by which the workers were deprived of overtime was the failure of H.P. Services to account for “fringe” payments in tallying hourly pay rates for the purpose of calculating overtime, the suit says. 

Overall, the nature of H.P. Services workers’ jobs, i.e. that the company controlled essentially every aspect of their work, resembled that of bona fide employees, and not independent contractors, the lawsuit contends.

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