A Tucson hotel has been ordered to pay tens of thousands of dollars in back pay to employees.
Viharas Group Inc., doing business as DoubleTree Suites by Hilton in Tucson, agreed to pay 44 current and previous employees nearly $42,000 in back wages, interest and damages.
Managers of the hotel, at 7051 S. Tucson Blvd., were accused in a U.S. Department of Labor investigation of intentionally withholding overtime pay to the employees, most of whom worked in landscaping, housekeeping or food service.
Labor Department investigators found hotel managers deliberately deleted most overtime hours the affected employees worked from an electronic time system, then recorded the time manually on sheets.
Workers were then paid cash wages for the overtime hours at rates lower than their legally required overtime rates.
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The investigation also found that at least 12 employees were paid just $7.50 per hour, below the state-mandated $7.65 hourly minimum wage, Labor Department spokesman Jesus Olivares said.
The employees had originally been shorted $21,000 in wages, Labor investigators found. Federal law requires that employers found to have shorted workers out of pay to reimburse them at double the original rate of pay.
In addition to the back pay and damages, the hotel agreed to pay $9,800 in penalties. The owner couldn’t be located for comment and a DoubleTree spokesperson did not return a call.