Trucking company pays to settle transparency lawsuit

How much does the job pay? It’s a simple question that companies often try to avoid.

However, a large trucking company is going to have to pay up after being accused of not providing an adequate answer to job seekers in Washington.

Knight Transportation, based in Phoenix, settled a lawsuit with nearly 100 truck driver applicants in Washington. The company is accused of breaking the state’s pay-transparency law. This law requires employers to share specific wage details instead of vague phrases like “average pay.”

The company failed to include a wage scale in job posts, making it the second mega carrier to settle a pay-transparency lawsuit in the state.

Since Jan. 1, 2023, the pay-transparency law has mandated that employers include a wage scale or salary range in job postings. They must also describe all benefits and other compensation.

For example, a salary range can be “$45,000 to $60,000” but cannot be “$45,000 per year and up” or “up to $29 per hour.” Piece-rate wages are also required to include a range, such as “$0.55 to $0.63 per mile.”

In February 2024, a class-action lawsuit accused Knight Transportation of violating the pay-transparency law.

After Jan. 1, 2023, the carrier posted a regional refrigerated truck driver job on the Drive Pulse app that mentioned $1,300 per week average pay. Most of its other job posts were similar.

The lawsuit claimed job seekers “lost valuable time applying for a job with (Knight Transportation).” It argued they were harmed by not being able to evaluate or negotiate pay. Applicants also could not compare this pay to similar truck driving jobs.

Per state statute, Knight Transportation could have owed $5,000 to each of the 98 job applicants identified, totaling nearly $500,000. Instead, attorneys settled the case for $110,000. After attorney fees and other costs, the net settlement amount is less than $51,000, or about $520 per applicant.

This is much less than the $4.2 million settlement J.B. Hunt agreed to in a similar case. Filed by the same two plaintiffs months after the Knight Transportation lawsuit, it also accused J.B. Hunt of violating pay-transparency laws. They reached a settlement in just over a month.

Washington’s pay-transparency law has since been amended to offer companies more leeway for noncompliance.

Signed by the governor in May, formerly bill SB5408, the new law requires applicants to notify employers of noncompliance before filing a lawsuit. If the company corrects the mistake within five business days, it cannot be sued for penalties or damages. This change took effect on July 27.

Companies that miss the five-day window may owe much less. Before July 27, plaintiffs could seek $5,000 for each noncompliant job posting. The law firm Morgan Lewis points out that “this led to a tidal wave of class-action lawsuits seeking significant damages from employers based on violations as minor as a single noncompliant job posting.” The original law did not clarify whether the penalty was a fixed or maximum amount.

Now, employers who violate the pay-transparency law can be on the hook for “no less than $100 and no more than $5,000 per violation.” The size of the penalty may be based on whether the violation was willful and/or a repeat, the size of the company and the amount necessary to deter future noncompliance. LL