On September 12, 2014, an employee of Centene Management Company, LLC (“CMC”) filed a collective and class action in Washington federal court seeking unpaid overtime wages under federal and state law. The suit alleges that CMC misclassified “Case Managers,” also known as pre-certification nurses, prior authorizations nurses, and concurrent review nurses, as exempt and, as a result, failed to pay them overtime wages when they worked more than forty hours in a workweek. According to the complaint, CMC is a subsidiary of Centene Corporation, which is a multi-line healthcare enterprise providing programs and services to a number of underinsured and uninsured individuals. CMC operates offices all around the country, including an office in Tacoma, Washington.
Rachhana T. Srey, one of the attorneys representing the plaintiffs, stated, “We believe that CMC’s case managers are not exempt under the overtime laws. We prevailed on the exemption issue for the same type of workers in a case against another one of Centene Corporation’s subsidiaries, Centene Company of Texas, and we’re confident that the same result will be reached here. We seek back pay and additional liquidated damages for the long hours these employees have dedicated to the company.”
The lawsuit seeks to recover overtime pay for all current and former case managers employed by CMC at any of its many locations at any time within the past three years. The case is entitled Randolph v. Centene Management Company, LLC, and was filed in the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington. The case number is 3:14-cv-05730.
The plaintiff is represented by Rachhana T. Srey and Alex M. Baggio of Nichols Kaster, PLLP, which has offices in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and San Francisco, California; David Langenfeld of Dunham & Jones, P.C. in Austin, Texas; and Toby Marshall of Terrell Marshall Daudt & Willie, PLLC in Seattle, Washington. Additional information is available here or by contacting Nichols Kaster toll-free at (877) 448-0492.
