Computer Sciences Corporation II

Issue: Misclassification of IT workers
Result: Jury Verdict for Plaintiffs and $17.6 million settlement

In 2005, Computer Sciences Corporation (“CSC”) settled for $24 million a nationwide class and collective action lawsuit alleging that CSC misclassified thousands of its information technology support workers as exempt from overtime pay in violation of in violation of the federal Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”) and state law.

Notwithstanding that settlement, a complaint filed on behalf of current and former CSC IT workers in 2014 by Lieff Cabraser and co-counsel alleged that CSC misclassified CSC System Administrators as exempt even though they performed primarily nonexempt work. On June 9, 2015, the Court granted plaintiffs’ motion for conditional certification of a FLSA collective action. Thereafter, more than 1,000 System Administrators opted into the case.

On June 30, 2017, the Court granted plaintiffs’’ motion for certification of Rule 23 classes for System Administrators in California and Connecticut. On December 20, 2017, a federal court jury in Connecticut ruled that CSC wrongly and willfully denied overtime pay to approximately 1,000 current and former technology support workers around the country.

After deliberating over two days, the Connecticut jury unanimously rejected CSC’s claim that its System Administrators in the “Associate Professional” and “Professional” job titles were exempt under federal, Connecticut and California law, ruling instead that the workers should have been classified as nonexempt and paid overtime. The jury found CSC’s violations to be willful, triggering additional damages. The misclassifications were made despite the fact that, in 2005, CSC paid $24 million to settle similar claims from a previous group of technical support workers.

Following judgment and an appeal to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, the parties reached a settlement for a total payment of $17,600,000.