FreightWorks Hit with Class Action Over March 2023 Layoffs

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FreightWorks faces a proposed class action that alleges the trucking company illegally failed to provide at least 60 days’ advance notice before terminating roughly 180 workers in March 2023. 

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The 17-page lawsuit alleges FreightWorks violated the federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act when it laid off nearly 200 people at its Rutherfordton, North Carolina facility around March 6 without at least 60 days’ advance written notice, much less pay and benefits for that amount of time. 

The 20 lead plaintiffs who filed the case each claim to have been laid off without cause amid a “mass layoff and/or plant closing” as defined in the WARN Act. FreightWaves.com reports that the defendants shuttered after 11 years of operations after certain major customers demanded “massive rate and volume concessions.” 

The plaintiffs contest that FreightWorks is covered by the federal WARN Act given that it employed 100 or more people, exclusive of part-time employees, or employed 100 or more people who in aggregate worked at least 4,000 hours per week, exclusive of overtime. 

Per the case, the decision to shut down the company was made, at least in part, by FreightWorks President Josh Farmer. FreightWorks’ vice president of operations, Joyce Siqueira, stated on March 6 that “we’re just not going to be able to pull through this one,” and that the company would be shutting down with “the foundational values” with which it was run, the lawsuit states. 

According to the suit, Siqueira stated in a video message that “we feel the most honorable path that we can take for the benefit of our employees, our customers and our other stakeholders is an orderly closing of the company,” and on March 8 employees received a letter that confirmed the termination of their employment with FreightWorks, the filing shares. 

In a March 31 letter, the suit continues, the company cited “an unforeseen, significant downturn in business from a key customer and a resulting corporate-wide reorganization” as the culprit behind the layoffs. FreightWaves.com wrote that the “death knell” for FreightWorks came when one of its largest contracts on February 28 of this year “pulled a significant percentage of the company’s freight,” causing “an immediate and devastating impact” on the company’s ability to make payroll and cover essential costs. 

“The Defendants failed to pay the Plaintiffs and each of the Class Members their respective wages, salary, commissions, bonuses, accrued holiday pay and accrued vacation for 60 working days following their respective terminations, and failed to make the pension and 401(k) contributions, provide other employee benefits under ERISA, and pay their medical expenses for 60 days from and after the dates of their respective terminations.” 

The case looks to cover all individuals who were terminated by FreightWorks on or around March 6, 2023 as the “reasonably foreseeable result of the mass layoff and/or plant closing” ordered by the company. 

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