A Medical Device Daily

ResCare (Louisville, Kentucky), a provider of in-home therapeutic, educational, and training services, violated federal labor law by not paying workers for travel time to and from job assignments, according to a federal lawsuit filed Tuesday.

According to the law firms that filed the lawsuit in Georgia federal court alleging violations of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), the case could affect thousands of current and former employees of ResCare and its subsidiaries, including Southern Home Care Services (Rome, Georgia).

The law firms representing the workers said they will seek to have the case certified as a collective action intended to recover back wages for eligible current and former employees who have provided services to defendants' medically home-bound clients at the residences of those clients since March 2004.

Attorney Kevin Hooks, of Kevin E. Hooks & Associates, of Savannah, Georgia, one of the firms representing the workers said: "Many employees of ResCare and its subsidiaries work in rural areas, and some drive long distances from house to house to deliver services. The law is clear that workers must be paid for travel when it's an integral part of the job. Companies like ResCare rely on personnel who typically work out of their homes, and report to a regional or divisional office periodically, generally to pick up schedules and paychecks. Employees who work on this basis too often are not informed of their rights when it comes to 'wage and hour' law."

The case is "Geddis, et al., v. Southern Home Care Services, Inc., et al.," (No. 3 07-CV-036-JTC) in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, Newnan Division.

The Geddis case is separate from recent or pending FLSA lawsuits filed against ResCare and its subsidiaries in Oklahoma and Indiana.