Pinky Cole declined to comment on the lawsuit, which was filed by a former employee who accuses Cole and two co-owners of violating federal employment law.
ATLANTA — One of Atlanta’s most successful restaurateurs and businesswomen, Aisha “Pinky” Cole, has been sued in federal court by a former employee who accuses Cole of taking part of the employees’ tips and also paying them less than minimum wage. . Court records show that she denies the claims in the lawsuit.
The allegations against Cole attempt to portray a side of her that is the opposite of anything the public has come to know: the Pinky Cole who made millions creating a popular vegan brand and earned a reputation for transforming her brand into generous philanthropy.
“I am helping people,” Cole said in June 2022, “by offering people a helping hand and giving them a chance to be the best version of themselves.”
The lawsuit against Cole was filed in federal court in Atlanta on November 11. On Wednesday, two months after the lawsuit was filed, Cole’s lawyers will file their formal response to the allegations.
The woman suing Cole, Morgan Georgia, says in the lawsuit that she worked for Cole at Bar Vegan in Atlanta’s Ponce City Market for two and a half years; she is also suing Cole’s two co-owners, Aaron Mattison and Jason Crane, as well as the business itself.
Two other current or former employees, Amber Abney and Kandus LeBlanc, joined the lawsuit against Bar Vegan and its owners. “Other servers and bartenders, who find themselves in a similar situation as the Named Plaintiff, are interested in joining this class action,” according to the lawsuit.
Georgia accuses the three owners of demanding 25% of tips from employees, while paying them below minimum wage, telling employees, according to the lawsuit, “25% of tips go to the house . That is our policy. If you don’t like it, find another place to work.”
Can an employer take any part of an employee’s tips?
“No, absolutely not,” Atlanta attorney Ed Buckley said Tuesday, “and that is a violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act. And there are civil penalties when an employer does something like that.”
Buckley, who is not associated with the lawsuit, said that under federal law, an employer must pay at least the minimum wage, $7.25 an hour. But the employer is allowed to pay “tipped workers” much less, $2.13 per hour, as long as the workers keep 100% of their tips, and as long as the tips make up the difference of $5.12 per hour.
Buckley said that, under the law, any amount the employee earns in tips above $7.25 an hour also belongs to the employee, and employers can’t keep any of it.
Karen Bremer, executive director of the Georgia Restaurant Association, told 11Alive News that tipped workers earn, on average, the equivalent of $27 an hour.
The lawsuit does not say how much money Georgia or other employees made in tips, or how much money the business owners would have raised by keeping 25% of the tips.
The lawsuit says simply that Cole and his co-owners paid employees $2.13 an hour, but kept a portion of the employees’ tips, “for the benefit of the defendants…” which Buckley says would violate the law.
According to the lawsuit, “although Defendants may require Plaintiffs to give a portion of their tips to other tipped employees as part of a valid tip pooling agreement, Defendants may not require Plaintiffs to give any part of their tips.” of their tips to non-tipped employees and Defendants”. you can’t simply withhold tips…for operating expenses and other improper and illegal purposes under the FLSA (Fair Labor Standards Act).”
According to the lawsuit, “the annual gross sales and business conducted by Bar Vegan in each of the three years prior to the filing of this lawsuit exceeds $500,000.”
Buckley said it would be relatively easy to prove, if it’s been happening; she has handled similar cases against employers.
“And they do things because they think they can get away with it,” Buckley said, “or they do things because they’re intimidating employees and they think employees will continue to be intimidated… It actually happens more than is reported. ”
Georgia says in her lawsuit that she and other employees “regularly asked Defendants during their shifts, at staff meetings, and when they received their paychecks about the significant percentage of their tips that Defendants withheld. On occasion, Defendants told them Claimants that the retained tips were provided backs at Bar Vegan, but the bar backs did not receive the retained tips.”
Pinky Cole and her attorney declined to comment.
On Wednesday, the defendants filed an 18-page response to the lawsuit with the court outlining the assertions they deny in the lawsuit.
“The named plaintiff and others allegedly in a similar situation failed to mitigate their claimed damages (which are expressly denied) by complying with Bar Vegan’s internal policies and procedures,” the court filing reads. “Put another way, the alleged damages suffered were avoidable consequences resulting from the misconduct of Plaintiffs and members of the putative FLSA class.”
Georgia is demanding unpaid wages and tips that she says Cole and his co-owners concealed from her and other employees for the past three years. The defendants are asking the court to dismiss the complaint with prejudice, the documents show.
You can read the full document below:
Source: news.google.com