Unfortunately, I was talking to a DOL Supervisor. After languishing for over a year, my case was finally assigned to an investigator. She seemed to be in total agreement with me that the former employer had misclassified their workers (and continued to do so). Then she handed her findings over to her supervisor. That man is the one who told me he was inclined to dismiss because of my salary. He seemed completely ignorant of the labor law, not even versed in the info I found readily online! The original investigator suggested I speak to his supervisor and that was the woman I spoke to this week. She was no help, displaying the same lack of information and indifference.
Both acted like I was not important because I was a white collar worker. They kept saying they had other cases that involved blue collar workers who had waited longer than I, and that they were very busy, and not required to take every case that came across their desk etc.
I just found an ABC News expose report from 2009 about the DOL's glaring incompetence called "Caught on Tape: Government Ineptitude Every year, bosses steal what could be billions in wages from their workers – and the federal government has largely failed to protect employees from such abuse, an undercover investigation has found.":
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=7163805&page=1
Sigh. If I knew that they were so backlogged and unwilling to actually work I would have just hired a lawyer in the first place.
Asker
Posted over 13 years ago.
Unfortunately, I was talking to a DOL Supervisor. After languishing for over a year, my case was finally assigned to an investigator. She seemed to be in total agreement with me that the former employer had misclassified their workers (and continued to do so). Then she handed her findings over to her supervisor. That man is the one who told me he was inclined to dismiss because of my salary. He seemed completely ignorant of the labor law, not even versed in the info I found readily online! The original investigator suggested I speak to his supervisor and that was the woman I spoke to this week. She was no help, displaying the same lack of information and indifference.
Both acted like I was not important because I was a white collar worker. They kept saying they had other cases that involved blue collar workers who had waited longer than I, and that they were very busy, and not required to take every case that came across their desk etc.
I just found an ABC News expose report from 2009 about the DOL's glaring incompetence called "Caught on Tape: Government Ineptitude Every year, bosses steal what could be billions in wages from their workers – and the federal government has largely failed to protect employees from such abuse, an undercover investigation has found.":
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=7163805&page=1
Sigh. If I knew that they were so backlogged and unwilling to actually work I would have just hired a lawyer in the first place.