FLSA: PARAMEDICS AWARDED OVER $5 MILLION IN FLSA MISCLASSIFICATION CASE

In a recent decision showing public employers the cost of misclassifying employees under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), the Ninth Circuit upheld a lower court's decision that 119 City of Los Angeles paramedics who were dual-trained as firefighters and paramedics were misclassified as fire suppression employees. The City's error entitled the employees to back pay, liquidated damages, court costs and attorneys fees, totaling over $5 million. (Cleveland v. City of Los Angeles (9th Cir. 2005) 420 F.3d 981.)

The FLSA allows public safety agencies to require employees in the fields of fire suppression and law enforcement to work a set number of hours over a one- to four-week period before the employees may earn overtime. (29 U.S.C. § 207(k).) This so-called "7(k) exemption" potentially can save the employer thousands of dollars in overtime pay. However, the affected employees must be classified under the FLSA as working in fire prevention or law enforcement before the employer may set the modified work schedule.

The Cleveland decision is based on a finding the dual-trained paramedics were not responsible for engaging in fire prevention while working as paramedics on paramedic ambulances. The ambulances were not designed to provide fire protection services and were rarely dispatched to fire calls. The paramedics were not expected to wear fire protection gear, were not usually ordered to perform fire suppression and were expected only to perform medical services.

The court held the dual-function paramedics had to be paid under FLSA regular overtime compensation requirements because they were not engaged in fire protection activities for more than 20 percent of their work period. Therefore, the paramedics were owed back overtime wages for all hours worked over 40 hours in a workweek instead of the overtime they had received under the modified work schedule.