INDIANAPOLIS — The U.S. Department of Labor is alleging that the owner and chief financial officer of two Indianapolis home care companies shortchanged employees of overtime wages.
The department filed a complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana against Hahn March, the owner and operator of Signal Health Group Assisted Care @ Home and SHG Employee Leasing Co., as well as Nancy Stanley, the chief financial officer.
This comes after March was cited in 2018 for not paying overtime wages to employees at Aging and Disabled Home Healthcare in Indiana.
According to a news release from the department, Signal Health Group, an Indianapolis company, provides clients medical services under the name Signal Health Group Assisted Care @ Home. SHG Employee Leasing Company Inc. is a Nevada corporation that conducts business around Indianapolis to provide Signal Health Group’s clients other services, including housekeeping, errands and bathing assistance.
The complaint alleges that March and Stanley shortchanged their employees $86,427 in overtime wages from March 2020 through March 2022. Overtime wages are 1.5 times a worker’s regular rates for hours worked in excess of 40 in a workweek.
The department alleges the two specifically avoided the overtime requirement by:
- Setting an “artificially low” hourly rate of pay and paying overtime hours at 1.5 times the rate to “make it appear they were paying the overtime premiums for hours worked over 40 in a workweek.”
- Mislabeling wages as “purported discretionary ‘bonuses,'”
- Separated hours worked by employees for Signal Health Group and SHG Employee Leasing for the purposes of calculating overtime. This caused the employees to not pay overtime wages for employees who worked more than 40 hours total across both companies.
- Failed to compensate employees for hours worked while traveling between job sites during the workday.
“The Department of Labor has asked the U.S. District Court to recover wages denied to these workers by their employers and to serve notice that trying to evade responsibilities in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act will not be tolerated,” Regional Solicitor of Labor Christine Heri said in the release. “When employers attempt to devise workarounds to avoid paying workers the wages they have rightfully earned, the department will seek to hold them accountable in court.”
The release said that the department is seeking $172,854, including $86,427 in back wages, for 43 current and former employees. The department is also asking the court to issue an order forbidding March and Stanley from future Fair Labor Standards Act violations.
“Employees who work in home healthcare – one of our nation’s lowest-paying professions – provide necessary daily and hospice care that allows individuals to remain in their homes and aids them in navigating their basic needs, providing dignity and comfort to clients and their families,” Wage and Hour Division District Director Aaron Loomis said in the release. “The Department of Labor is committed to protecting workers’ rights and holding employers accountable for violating federal law.”
