Lawsuit Claims QVC Call Center Workers Owed Unpaid Wages for Login, Logout Time

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A proposed collective action claims QVC, Inc. has failed to pay its customer service call center employees for time spent logging into and out of computer and phone systems before and after their shifts.

Per the case, this uncompensated time caused employees to work more than 40 hours per week, and should have been paid at their time-and-a-half overtime rates.

The plaintiff, who worked for QVC at its Chesapeake, Virginia call center between June 2019 and March 2020, says she spent roughly 10 to 20 minutes before each shift starting and logging into various computer systems, applications and the phone system before she was able to clock in. According to the suit, QVC “arbitrarily” failed to count this time as hours worked even though there was “no practical administrative difficulty” in recording the plaintiff’s and other employees’ login time.

“It could be precisely recorded for payroll purposes simply by allowing them to clock in and be paid before they brought up Defendant’s computer systems, applications, and phone system,” the complaint says.

The lawsuit argues that the time spent logging into the defendant’s systems before each shift was part of employees’ “principal activities,” required by QVC and performed for the company’s benefit. Moreover, the unpaid work was an “integral and indispensable” part of the workers’ job duties given they could not perform their work without logging into the defendant’s systems, the case attests.

Similarly, the plaintiff says she spent approximately 10 to 15 minutes after clocking out of her shift logging off and shutting down QVC’s computer systems, applications and phone system. This time went unpaid even though it was required by QVC and could have easily been recorded for payroll purposes, the suit alleges. 

The lawsuit claims employees’ login and logout times, as well as other off-the-clock work performed when the workers were not logged into the defendant’s computer systems, caused them to put in more than 40 hours per week and thus should have been paid at their time-and-a-half overtime rates. 

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