In recent years, California Employees have gained significant ground in the enforcement of California overtime laws in class action litigation. Thousands of Employees have benefited and received their overtime pay through this effective legal tool.

A class action lawsuit allows an attorney to represent one individual or several individuals to sue a large group sometimes in the hundreds or even thousands. Because there is strength in numbers, class action suits are a powerful tool.

When filing law suits, there are several factors to be considered prior to bringing a law suit as a class action:

• Commonality – do those affected share common claims?
• Adequacy of Representation – will the attorneys bringing the complaint be adequately qualified to represent the group or the “class”?
• Numerosity – are enough Employees affected to warrant a class action filing?
• Typicality – attorneys must decide if the claims of the individual(s) initiating the class action are typical of those of the entire group.

If you are a California Employee and feel that not only you, but others who perform the same or similar job function are being deprived of overtime rights, meal and break periods, vacation or accrued sick pay or reimbursable expenses, a class action may be warranted.

Some of the most common types of class action cases involve Employers who misclassify Employees as exempt, when in fact they are non-exempt and entitled to overtime pay. Millions and millions of dollars in settlements have been paid out to Employees of the computer software and IT field who have been deprived of overtime as well as other fields in management, and retail.

It is not uncommon to see even some of the world's largest Employers systematically misclassify large groups of Employees. It is curious with the resources to hire some of the largest and most prestigious labor firms that these corporations continue to defy California overtime laws and misclassify or otherwise deprive California Employees from overtime pay. When this occurs, filing a California class action may be an effective remedy.

A California class action attorney can effectively evaluate a claim to determine if the individual claimant may be entitled to overtime pay or other related remedies. If this is the case, the class action attorney will then evaluate the other factors of the class case, such as numerosity to determine if there are enough claimants who are similarly situated to merit the filing of a California class action.