Pittsburgh Wage And Hour Independent Contractor Attorneys

November 13, 2014

Pittsburgh wage and hour independent contractor attorneys

Wage and hour class action and individual lawsuits have been popping up all over the country of late. This is especially true in the oil and gas industry, where people who work as pumpers, drivers, and oilfield engineers are being grossly underpaid by their employers. There are several types of ways employers classify their employees so as to pay them. Some are considered “day rate” employees, which we have covered in other blog posts. Today, we’re going to talk about how independent contractors are commonly unpaid and underpaid by employers. People who feel that they’ve been underpaid or unpaid by an employer will need an experienced wage and hour attorney to be their advocate.

Payment of independent contractors

One of the most popular oil and gas industry practices is to enter into a job as an independent contractor. Wage and hour lawsuits can be difficult to understand for independent contractors, which is why employers often overwork their contracts and then fail to correctly pay them, shorting those types of workers hundreds, sometimes thousands of dollar for a job.

While the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) don’t necessarily include independent contractors as what they consider an “employee,” there are still laws and parts of the FLSA that call into question how fairly treated a worker might be, regardless of the worker’s status as an employee or independent contractor.

Quality, experienced wage and hour attorneys take every case for what it’s worth. It is often a fact-finding mission to help prove what’s known in the business as the “economic realities” of the relationship between the independent contractor and the employer. And, to be sure, the court will consider such factors as how much the company you were contracted by could control the quality of your work and how much individual investment you as the contractor have put into the job. When employers hire a large amount of independent contractors to perform a single job, that’s usually a clear sign that there are FLSA wage and hour infractions going on within the company.

If you have questions about FLSA wage and hours laws, call the Pittsburgh wage and hour lawsuit lawyers at Goodrich and Geist at 800-806-2456 or 412-837-8426 for a free consultation today.

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