Private Attorneys General Act Review – 2023 - Report - Page 26
not meet the requisite amount-in-controversy under the CAFA. The district court
explained that in PAGA actions, penalties based on other employees' rights cannot be
aggregated into the amount-in-controversy. Id. at *3. Based on the defendant’s
calculation from the plaintiff’s pay records, the amount-in-controversy for the plaintiff’s
individual claim was $13,850. Although attorneys’ fees could be included, the district
court opinion that there was parallel class action being litigated by the same plaintiff's
counsel, which would likely result in time savings sufficient to reduce the total fees
under the requisite amount. For these reasons, the district court granted the motion to
remand.
In Valencia, et al. v. Mattress Firm, Inc., 2023 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 26863 (N.D. Cal. Feb.
16, 2023), the plaintiff filed a state court wage-and-hour representative action brought
under California's Private Attorneys General Act (PAGA). After removing the action to
the district court, the defendant filed a motion to compel arbitration of the individual
portion of plaintiff's claim and dismiss the representative portion for lack of standing.
The district court granted in part and denied in part the motion. At the commencement
of her employment, the plaintiff agreed to the defendant’s arbitration policy which
required arbitration of "claims arising under any statutes or regulations applicable to
applicants, to employees, or to the employment relationship.” Id. at *2. The agreement
further provided that the plaintiff waived "any right to bring claims as class, collective, or
representative actions" Id. The plaintiff did not dispute that she signed the arbitration
agreement as a condition of her employment, however, contended that the agreement
was unenforceable as unconscionable and was null and void because the United States
Supreme Court's recent decision in Viking River Cruises, Inc. v. Moriana, 142 S. Ct.
1906 (2022), upheld California's prohibition on wholesale waivers of PAGA claims. The
district court first rejected the unconscionable argument, finding no substantive
unconsiconablity. The district court next looked to the PAGA waiver, and found that it
was consistent with the Supreme Court's holding in Viking River and is thus consistent
with applicable law. The plaintiff argued that the arbitration agreement's representative
action waiver qualified as the kind of comprehensive waiver of PAGA claims that was
disallowed under California law. The defendant contended that the decision supported
its position that the individual portion of the plaintiff's PAGA claim must proceed in
arbitration. The district court found that since the agreement allowed the plaintiff to raise
the individual portion of her PAGA claim, it did not operate as a wholesale waiver and
thus, the defendant was entitled to enforce the agreement to the extent that it required
the plaintiff to bring the individual portion of her PAGA claim in arbitration. Id. at *8.
However, the district court agreed to stay the representative PAGA claim pending the
California Supreme Court’s ruling in Adolph, et al. v. Uber Technologies Inc., 2022 Cal.
App. Unpub. LEIS 2170 (Cal. App. April 11, 2022), which will address the no-individual
standing issue post-Viking. Accordingly, the district court granted in part the defendant’s
motion to compel arbitration.
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PAGA Litigation Review – 2023
