XPO Last Mile settles third multimillion dollar wage lawsuit

XPO Logistics has settled another wage lawsuit with drivers in a California courtroom. This time, nearly 4,000 drivers will split $5.5 million. Two other similar lawsuits have been settled since May.

According to federal court documents from the U.S. District Court in Northern California, XPO Last Mile agreed to pay 3,772 class members $5.5 million to end a lawsuit that was originally filed in December 2016.

The lawsuit claims that XPO Last Mile failed to provide legally compliant meal and rest breaks, failed to pay wages for all hours worked, waiting time penalties, reimbursement of business expenses and legally compliant pay stubs, according to settlement documents.

If every class member participates in the settlement, each driver will receive an average of $935.18.

Ibanez v. XPO Last Mile

In a lawsuit filed in 2016, Hector Ibanez, on behalf of thousands of other XPO Last Mile drivers in California, accuse the company of misclassifying them as independent contractors. Accordingly, the drivers claim they were not paid for certain hours afforded to employees.

More specifically, the lawsuit states that drivers worked in excess of 12 hours in a day and 40 hours in a week. However, they were not paid overtime because of their misclassification as independent drivers.

Considering drivers were not paid for overtime hours, the lawsuit claims that the rate they were paid when accounting for those hours falls below the minimum wage. This includes not receiving pay for meal and rest periods required under California wage laws.

Under the assumption that drivers were due these unpaid wages, the lawsuit claims that XPO Last Mile consequently violated laws regarding wages not timely paid upon termination and noncompliant wage statements.

Company’s other wage cases in California

Although the lawsuit did not go into details regarding misclassification, several other similar lawsuits have been pending during litigation. For the most part, wage lawsuits in California have been an uphill battle for XPO.

At least two other lawsuits against XPO Last Mile were settled just before or around the same time as the Ibanez case.

• In Carter v. XPO Last Mile, filed in March 2016, XPO reached a settlement agreement in June worth $16.5 million.
• Garcia v. Macy’s West Stores, XPO Logistics reached a preliminary settlement of $3.5 million in May.

In the Carter case, the complaint explains how XPO controls nearly all aspects of Last Mile drivers’ operations, including delivery routes, physical appearances and determining truck specs.