TikTok refused to pay employees for overtime but expected the hours, lawsuit says
Two former TikTok employees are suing the social media company, saying TikTok never paid them, and refused to pay them, for several hours of overtime they worked weekly.
There are many more current and former sales employees who’ve been denied wages by TikTok, according to the federal lawsuit filed as a collective action in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California on Nov. 11.
TikTok didn’t immediately respond to McClatchy News’ request for comment Nov. 12.
The plaintiffs who brought the lawsuit against ByteDance, which does business as TikTok, both worked for the company as inside sales representatives in Travis County, Texas, the complaint says.
One of the employees, who stopped working for the company in November 2023, was repeatedly told by two of his managers that he was “required” to put in overtime for his sales position.
The managers told him “that that was ‘the expectation’ and ‘par for the course,’” the complaint says.
On average, he worked about 12 hours of overtime every week without pay for roughly two years, according to the complaint.
When work was busy, he “sometimes worked dozens of hours of overtime,” the complaint says.
Under the Fair Labor Standards Act, if employees work more than 40 hours weekly, their employers have to pay them “at a rate not less than time and one-half their regular rates of pay,” according to the U.S. Department of Labor.
This doesn’t apply to employees who are exempt from overtime requirements.
According to the lawsuit, TikTok wrongly classified the two inside sales representatives, and others, as exempt from required overtime pay.
In July 2023, the one inside sales representative estimated he worked 65 or more hours one week, and 75 or more hours the following week, the complaint says.
The other former employee who’s named as a plaintiff worked for TikTok for nearly three years and worked about nine hours of overtime every week, according to the complaint.
Similar to the other employee, she worked several more hours a week when it was busy, the complaint says.
She “often worked overtime hours on weekends, either from (TikTok’s) office or remotely from her home office, taking calls from and/or making calls to, potential and current clients” and “often worked through her lunch break,” according to the complaint.
The lawsuit accuses TikTok of knowingly not paying its sales employees overtime.
“It was (TikTok’s) policy and practice to set sales goals that required overtime work and to encourage” its sales employees “to work on weekends and additional overtime hours throughout each sales period, but especially during the last portion of each sales period,” the complaint says.
TikTok is further accused of not recording the hours its sales employees worked.
The plaintiffs’ legal counsel said in a statement provided to McClatchy News on Nov. 12 by attorney Daniel S. Brome, one of the attorneys representing the case: “Companies like TikTok know that individuals performing inside sales work are generally entitled to overtime premiums, and know that demanding sales expectations and quotas pressure these employees to work long hours.”
“We believe plaintiffs and other inside sales representatives should be fairly paid for their extensive overtime work,” the statement added.
TikTok’s “unlawful conduct is widespread, repetitious, and consistent,” the complaint says.
The lawsuit demands a judgment against TikTok for accusations that the company violated the Fair Labor Standards Act.
It also seeks to recover unpaid back wages for the former employees, the complaint shows.
This story was originally published November 12, 2024 at 9:55 AM.
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