Google was in a lawsuit filed by its female employees Kelly Ellis, Holly Pease, Kelly Visuri and Heidi Lamar, named as plaintiffs before the Superior Court of the County of California, San Francisco. Google was the defendant.
The plaintiffs challenged Google’s pay and leveling procedures because they believed they were paid less than their male counterparts, who paid substantially the same. Work, Google challenged the allegations.
The women mentioned have worked in a cover position at Google in California since September 14, 2013.
one in StatementThe plaintiffs’ law firms Leif Cabraser Heyman & Bernstein and Altshuler Berzon said the settlement covers approximately 15,500 female workers in 236 job titles (“covered positions”) in California as of September 14, 2013.
In addition, the law firm said that in addition to monetary relief, the agreement provides that an independent third-party expert will analyze Google’s leveling-at-hire practices and an independent labor economist will review Google’s wage equity studies. The post settlement work over the next three years will be monitored by an external settlement monitor.
According to the law firm, the lawsuit challenges Google’s pay and leveling procedures, and the plaintiffs believe these programs will help ensure that women are not paid less than their male counterparts who are equally and Google’s challenging leveling practices are justified.
Kelly Ellis worked at Google as a software engineer for four years before leaving as a senior manager position. Meanwhile, Holly Peas has nearly 10.5 years of experience at Google in both Mountain View and Sunnyvale and has held various technical leadership roles during her service.
Kelli Wisuri worked at Google in its Mountain View office for nearly 2.5 years as Enterprise Operations Coordinator, Enterprise Sales Operations Associate, and Google Brand Evangelist, Executive Communications Program (aka Sales Solutions Senior Associate). As for Heidi Lamar, she was a preschool teacher and infant/toddler teacher at Google’s Children’s Center in Palo Alto for almost four years.
in the court documentIt was stated that the plaintiff had filed the class action complaint on September 14, 2017 and the first amended complaint on January 3, 2018.
Under the first amended complaint, the plaintiffs allege Google in violation of the California Equal Pay Act (“EPA”), failure to pay all wages and unfair business practices by causing employees to lay off and leave.
Earlier on June 7 this year, the plaintiff had filed a condition and demanded
Court permission to file a second amended complaint, adding a cause of action under the California Labor Code Private Attorney General Act (“PAGA”).
However, Google continued to refute the allegations in the plaintiffs’ complaints, including that it is liable under the EPA, UCL, FEHA, or any other applicable law. It further denies that it caused harm to anyone, and denies that the nominated plaintiff or class member is entitled to the requested relief.
However, Google has agreed to a settlement of $118 million.
“All payments considered in this resolution are inclusive of the total settlement amount, except for individual payments to the named plaintiff in consideration of the release of their individual, non-class claims,” the court document said.
Thus, Google has agreed to pay the named plaintiffs a total of $200,000 – an allocation of $50,000 each. Google will make this payment within 60 days of the effect of settlement.
As for next steps, the plaintiffs’ law firm said in the statement, that the court would set a hearing date for preliminary settlement approval, which would result in third-party administrators issuing notices to class members. If the court subsequently grants final settlement approval, the third-party administrator will allocate settlement amounts to each eligible class member based on an objective formula.