Hair Cuttery Chain Florida Lawsuit
Hair Cuttery’s owners are intentionally refusing to pay many employees for their work, leading up to the chain’s coronavirus closures – even though salons profited from it.
According to the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida lawsuit, the Hair Cuttery chain in Florida has at least 500 employees still waiting for their April 7th paychecks.
Ratner Cos. And Creative Hairdressers Inc., owners and operators for Hair Cuttery locations nationwide have been sued by Angela Miller and Madelyn Mirable, under the Fair Labor Standards Act and State Law. This is the second accusation against Ratner Cos. And its executives for stiffing employees during the pandemic this month.
Since the salons closed due to COVID-19, employees claim that Ratner did not pay employees for hours worked from March 15-21. Three more Hair Cuttery employees in Florida, Maryland, and Virginia have since joined that suit.
Since the lawsuit was filed, more employees from Illinois, Florida, and Virginia have reported to Bloomberg Law that they did not receive their wages for the workweek and have not been allowed to use their paid time off during the COVID-19 closures. On April 8th, an employee in South Florida claimed she did not receive her commissions, despite earning the salon more than $1,200 that workweek.
It is not certain whether the company treated everyone as claimed in the lawsuits. An employee in New Jersey told Bloomberg Law that workers were allowed to keep their tips that week.
It’s “selfish and unlawful,” to withhold earned and “desperately needed” wages, Wolfgang Florin of Florin Gray LLC, representing the plaintiffs in the Florida case. These employees went into the salons “as this crisis deepened, risking themselves and their families’ wellbeing,” to serve customers and generate revenue for Hair Cuttery, he said.
The companies haven’t responded to requests for comment.
The cases are Miller v. Creative Hairdressers, Inc., M.D. Fla., No. 20-cv-00912, 4/20/20, and Olsen v. Ratner Cos., D.N.J., No. 20-cv-03760, 4/7/20.
