Nevett v. Renown Health

District Court, D. Nevada·Decided August 24, 2022·No. 3:21-cv-00319·Unknown

Opinion

EMILY NEVETT and BONNIE NOBLE, on behalf of themselves and all other similarly situated individuals, Case No. 3:21-cv-00319-RCJ-CSD

Plaintiffs, ORDER

v.

RENOWN HEALTH, et al.,

Defendants.

Plaintiffs Emily Nevett and Bonnie Noble allege, in their Second Amended Complaint (ECF No. 9) that their former employer, Defendant Renown Health (Renown), failed to properly pay them overtime wages as required by the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), 29 U.S.C § 207, and state law, Nev. Rev. Stat. § 608.018. They also allege Renown failed to pay them for all time worked as required by Nev. Rev. Stat. § 608.016 and failed to pay them all wages due and owing when they stopped working for Renown as required by Nev. Rev. Stat. § 608.020. Renown now moves to dismiss Plaintiffs’ First, Second, and Third Causes of Action in their Second Amended Complaint for failure to state a colorable claim. ECF No. 42. Plaintiffs oppose the motion. ECF No. 43. Having considered the allegations of the Second Amended Complaint and the arguments of the parties, the Court will grant the motion in part and deny it in part as follows. The Court will provide Plaintiffs one final opportunity to amend the dismissed claims. Nevett initiated this matter in state court in April 2020, as a class action suit against Renown, alleging 3 state law claims for failure to pay overtime, failure to compensate for all hours worked, and failure to pay wages due and owing. In June 2021, Renown moved for partial summary judgment. In response, Nevett moved to amend her complaint. Before Nevett was granted leave to amend, Renown removed the matter to this Court. Nevett moved to remand the litigation back to state court. The parties then stipulated that Nevett could file her proposed First Amended Complaint, and Nevett withdrew her motion to remand. The First Amended Complaint both added Noble as a

plaintiff and added the FLSA claim as a collective action. Renown moved to dismiss the First Amended Complaint. ECF No. 13. Plaintiffs opposed the motion. ECF No. 16. The Court granted the motion in part, denied it in part, and granted Plaintiffs leave to file an amended complaint to cure the deficiencies of their dismissed claims. Plaintiffs filed the instant Second Amended Complaint. ECF No. 39. Renown now moves to dismiss the First, Second, and Third Causes of Action. ECF No. 42. Plaintiffs oppose the motion. ECF No. 43. Nevett worked as a registered nurse for Renown from July 2018 to October 2019. Noble worked for Renown as a certified nursing assistant and as a unit clerk from 2015 to about August

2020. Renown used a time-keeping system known as “KRONOS” by which employees would clock in at the beginning of their shift and clock out at the end their shift. Employees would not clock out for meal breaks (and thus would not clock in at the end of a meal break). Rather, in computing the hours worked by an employee for each shift, Renown would deduct 30 minutes for the meal break. Renown did not verify whether an employee had taken a meal break. During meal breaks, Plaintiffs were required to carry a Renown-owned telephone or radio, to respond to any calls, and were not permitted to leave Renown’s premises. As part of their duties, Plaintiffs documented patient care notes and records in Renown’s

electronic medical records system, known as “EPIC.” The EPIC system would record the specific time that Plaintiffs entered data into the system. Plaintiffs allege that this time stamp in EPIC would, if compared to the KRONOS time records, show that they entered data into the EPIC system during meal breaks and when they were not clocked into the KRONOS system, i.e., when they were off- the-clock. Nevett alleges she worked in EPIC while not clocked into KRONOS on July 25, 2018.

Noble alleges she worked in EPIC while not clocked into KRONOS “when she was the only unit clerk the first few weeks of 2018.” Nevett had a regular schedule of three 12.5-hour shifts each week. For each shift, Renown compensated Nevett for 12 hours of work after deducting 30 minutes for the meal break. In addition to her regular shifts, she was also required to work a 12-hour on-call shift once each month. She alleges she worked approximately 10 on-call shifts during her employment.1 Nevett further alleges 0 working more than 40 hours in thirteen specific workweeks, which she identifies in paragraph 13 of the Second Amended Complaint.2 Noble initially had a regular schedule of three 12.5-hour shifts each week. Beginning sometime in 2019, Noble had a regular schedule of five 8.5-hour shifts each week. As with Nevett, for each shift Renown compensated Noble for 12 hours of work (for the 12.5-hour shifts) and 8 hours of work (for the 8-hour shifts) after deducting 30 minutes for the meal break. Noble does not allege any specific workweek in which she worked more than 40 hours. Noble and Nevett each allege they “regularly and routinely worked through” their meal breaks “in order to complete work tasks including charting in the EPIC system, caring for patients,

1 Nevett identifies the specific dates of these on-call shifts in paragraph 12 of the Second Amended Complaint. ECF No. 39 at 4. 2 The Court notes Nevett has not alleged a total of 23 different workweeks in which she worked in excess of 40 hours. Rather, some of the weeks she that alleges she worked on-call in addition to her regular shifts, as alleged in paragraph 12, are the same weeks that she alleges she worked more than 40 hours, as alleged in paragraph 13. and/or taking calls on the Renown provided telephone/radio specific to patients under [their] care.” Nevett alleges specifically recalling working during her meal break on September 6, 2018, February 4, 2019, June 24, 2019, and August 16, 2019. Noble alleges specifically recalling working during her meal break on May 19, 2019. Both allege that they were not compensated for working through

their respective meal breaks on the identified dates. Nevett further alleges that she received a non-discretionary bonus of $1,514.74 that was based upon her employee earnings during the preceding year. She alleges this bonus payment was not included in calculating her regular rate of pay for overtime payment calculations. Nevett further alleges that her regular rate of pay for a regular shift was $30.62 per hour. She alleges her regular base pay for her on-call shift was $45.93 per hour. She alleges that, for the weeks she worked an on-call shift, she was actually paid a total of $1,653.48 (representing 36 hours at $30.62 and 12 hours at $45.93). Nevett thus alleges that her regular rate of pay for weeks that she worked an on-call shift was $34.45 ($1,653.48 divided by 48 hours) and the overtime rate during such weeks was $51.68. Accordingly, she calculates that she should have been paid $1,791.44 (40

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