Mora v. U.S. Bancorp, 0:24-cv-04112

Plaintiff Arnelle Mora filed a proposed collective action against U.S. Bancorp and U.S. Bank National Association, alleging violations of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) for unpaid pre-shift work by hourly call center employees.
Plaintiff claims a company-wide policy required Customer Service Representatives (CSRs) to boot up computers and prepare for work before clocking in, resulting in uncompensated work.
Defendants maintain written policies that prohibit off-the-clock work and require accurate reporting of all time worked, but also require employees to be ready to work within five minutes of their scheduled shift start, threatening discipline for unapproved overtime.
Several opt-in plaintiffs support Mora’s claim, providing declarations that supervisors instructed them to exclude boot-up time from their reported hours, despite manual time tracking systems.
Defendants argue that any violations are the result of isolated managers, not company policy, and submit evidence asserting CSRs are properly trained on timekeeping and paid for all work performed.
Mora moved for conditional collective certification and court approval of notice to putative FLSA collective members; the court granted certification and notice in part.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Conditional FLSA Collective Certification	Mora: Provided colorable basis and declarations showing similarly situated CSRs subject to common, FLSA-violating policies.	U.S. Bank: No common unlawful policy; only isolated incidents; declarations not representative.	Certification granted; declarations and policies support a colorable basis at this stage.
Sufficient Interest in Collective Action	Five interested persons and opt-ins show enough interest for notice.	Too few opt-ins given size of potential class; limited to two business lines.	Five is sufficient for conditional certification; no line-based limitation.
Notice Mechanism	Notice should be sent via mail, email, and text; Plaintiff's counsel as collective counsel.	Notice should not use text or work email, only mail and personal email.	Notice allowed via mail and both work/personal email, not text; Plaintiff’s counsel appointed.
Scope of FLSA Collective	Collective should include all CSRs nationwide over three years.	If any, only Collections business line CSRs due to limited plaintiff representation.	Court certifies all hourly call center employees, not limited by business line.

Hoffmann-La Roche Inc. v. Sperling, 493 U.S. 165 (authorizes courts to manage notice in FLSA collective actions)
Bouaphakeo v. Tyson Foods, Inc., 765 F.3d 791 (plaintiffs are similarly situated when subject to a single FLSA-violating policy; liberally construed at notice stage)
Thiessen v. Gen. Elec. Cap. Corp., 267 F.3d 1095 (factors for analyzing similarity in FLSA collective actions)