More than 3,000 employees of Petersen Health Care, a long-term nursing facility company based in Peoria, were not paid overtime wages they were owed, according to an investigation by the U.S. Department of Labor.
Petersen operates long-term care facilities in the Midwest, including Illinois, Iowa, Indiana and Missouri. According to a release from the DOL, between 2019-2021, the company "failed to maintain accurate records of work hours ... failed to pay wages for meal periods of less than 20 minutes" and didn't factor in bonus or other incentive pay to workers' hourly rates when calculating overtime pay.
Employees of 84 long-term care facilities in Illinois, Iowa and Missouri will receive a share of $3 million in overtime backpay as a result of the investigation. CEO and owner Mark Petersen also signed a compliance agreement, saying the company would comply with the Fair Labor Standards Act in the future.
A spokesperson from Petersen Health Care declined to comment.
Petersen Health Care has been the subject of 30 federal labor investigations in the past 20 years. The DOL said its in release the company has "systematically violated wage and hour laws on numerous occasions."
If you think you may be owed back wages collected by the DOL's Wage and Hour Division, you can search a database of workers who have money waiting to be claimed.
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