Categories: Hospitality

On January 14, 2011, EpsteinBeckerGreen helped one of its restaurant clients, the Brasserie Ruhlmann, obtain summary judgment “in its entirety” in a lawsuit brought by former waiters, bussers, and runners (“Plaintiffs”).  Similar to many such wage and hour cases currently being litigated in the hospitality industry, Plaintiffs sought to invalidate the restaurant’s tip pool with assertions that captains and the banquet coordinator performed managerial functions and, thus, were not “tip eligible.”  If Plaintiffs had succeeded, they would have also invalidated the restaurant’s “tip credit” system of compensating service employees, potentially resulting in significant minimum wage and overtime liability.  Plaintiffs made further claims for tips during their initial training period, alleged “spread of hours” violations, and alleged uniform maintenance violations. 

In a sweeping 17-page Memorandum Opinion and Order, Judge Swain of the U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, found, among other things, that “captains and banquet coordinators had regular interactions with customers in connection with core restaurant functions.” Accordingly, the Court held that the restaurant had properly treated the plaintiffs as tip eligible.  After careful scrutiny, the restaurant’s wage and hour practices were completely vindicated by the Court. Garcia v. La Revise Assocs. LLC, 08 cv 9356 (SDNY 2011).

EpsteinBeckerGreen developed a strategy to elicit admissions from the Plaintiffs in discovery that, together with declarations and selected documents, provided the basis for Judge Swain’s decision. This case resulted in a total victory for the restaurant and is the first reported decision to hold that the position of banquet coordinator was tip eligible.

This win was achieved by EpsteinBeckerGreen’s Labor and Employment Hospitality and Wage and Hour practice groups and, particularly, attorneys Douglas Weiner and Dean L. Silverberg.

Back to Workforce Bulletin Blog

Search This Blog

Blog Editors

Related Services

Topics

Archives

Jump to Page

Subscribe

Sign up to receive an email notification when new Workforce Bulletin posts are published:

Privacy Preference Center

When you visit any website, it may store or retrieve information on your browser, mostly in the form of cookies. This information might be about you, your preferences or your device and is mostly used to make the site work as you expect it to. The information does not usually directly identify you, but it can give you a more personalized web experience. Because we respect your right to privacy, you can choose not to allow some types of cookies. Click on the different category headings to find out more and change our default settings. However, blocking some types of cookies may impact your experience of the site and the services we are able to offer.

Strictly Necessary Cookies

These cookies are necessary for the website to function and cannot be switched off in our systems. They are usually only set in response to actions made by you which amount to a request for services, such as setting your privacy preferences, logging in or filling in forms. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not then work. These cookies do not store any personally identifiable information.

Performance Cookies

These cookies allow us to count visits and traffic sources so we can measure and improve the performance of our site. They help us to know which pages are the most and least popular and see how visitors move around the site. All information these cookies collect is aggregated and therefore anonymous. If you do not allow these cookies we will not know when you have visited our site, and will not be able to monitor its performance.