In re Amazon.com, Inc. – Pa. Supreme Court – reported decision on certified question from 6th Circuit - July 21, 2021
Majority https://www.pacourts.us/assets/opinions/Supreme/out/J-76-2020mo%20-%20104839808140967303.pdf?cb=2
dissent https://www.pacourts.us/assets/opinions/Supreme/out/J-76-2020do%20-%20104839808140911397.pdf?cb=1
dissent https://www.pacourts.us/assets/opinions/Supreme/out/J-76-2020do1%20-%20104839808140963694.pdf?cb=1
Contrast the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Integrity Staffing Solutions v. Busk, 574 U.S. 27 (2014). In Busk, the high Court ruled that time spent by Amazon warehouse workers in Nevada going through the same security screenings the employees in the present case were subjected to was not compensable under the federal FLSA.
++++++++++++++++++++++++
We answer herein two certified questions from the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit: (1) whether time spent on an employer’s premises waiting to undergo, and undergoing, mandatory security screening is compensable as “hours worked” within the meaning of the Pennsylvania Minimum Wage Act1 (“PMWA”)?; and (2) whether the doctrine of de minimis non curat lex,2 as described in Anderson v. Mt. Clemens Pottery Co., 328 U.S. 680 (1946), applies to bar claims brought under the PMWA? Our reply to these questions is that time spent on an employer’s premises waiting to undergo, and undergoing, mandatory security screening constitutes “hours worked” under the PMWA; and there exists no de minimis exception to the PMWA.
1 43 P.S. §§ 333.101-333.115.
2 Literally translated, this Latin phrase means: “The law does not concern itself with trifles.”. It is frequently referred to in legal vernacular simply as “de minimis.” Id. Pursuant to this principle, “courts disregard trivial matters that serve merely to exhaust the court's time.” Bailey v. Zoning Board of Adjustment of the City of Philadelphia, 810 A.2d 492, 504 n.20 (Pa. 2002).
