LinkedIn pays nearly $6 million in overtime wages, damages after Labor Dept. investigation

NEW YORK, N.Y. – Professional networking service LinkedIn has agreed to pay nearly $6 million in unpaid wages and damages to 359 current and former employees, the Labor Department said on Monday.

The U.S. Department of Labor said an investigation found LinkedIn Corp. in violation of overtime and record-keeping rules that are part of the federal Fair Labor Standards Act. It said the violations occurred at company branches in California, Illinois, Nebraska and New York.

Mountain View, California-based LinkedIn said in a statement that it was “eager to work closely with the (Labor Department) to quickly and equitably rectify this situation. This was a function of not having the right tools in place for a small subset of our sales force to track hours properly; prior to the (Labor Department) approaching us, we had already begun to remedy this.”

The company agreed to pay the back wages once it was notified of the violations and to take steps to prevent them from happening again.

Federal law requires that hourly employees get paid 1.5 times their regular hourly rates for hours they work beyond 40 per week.