Three Manhattan Restaurants Named in Wage and Hour Lawsuit

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Eleven plaintiffs have filed suit against the operators of Manhattan restaurants Bistro Marketplace, Shelley’s Kitchen and Fresh Kitchen over alleged wage and hour abuses.

According to the complaint, the plaintiffs—current and former cooks, grillers and delivery workers—claim they put in over 40 hours per week for the defendants without receiving appropriate minimum, overtime and spread-of-hours wages. In fact, some plaintiffs allege they were not paid at all for weeks of work.

The case goes on to claim that the defendants were not entitled to take a tip credit against delivery workers’ wages as they spent over 20 percent of each shift stocking inventory, cleaning, preparing food and performing other non-tipped duties without notice that their wages would be offset. Further, the tipped plaintiffs allege that part or all of their weekly tips were regularly withheld by their employers.

Lastly, the suit says the defendants deducted 30 minutes from some plaintiffs’ weekly pay for breaks they were never allowed to take, as well as for meals they never ate, and failed to reimburse workers for uniform costs and MetroCards used to make deliveries.