On June 9, 2016, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas signed a joint stipulation that conditionally certified an FLSA collective action of oilfield MWD Operators in Meyer v. Blue Star Directional, LLC, Civil Action No. 4:15-cv-3335. In this day-rate MWD operator overtime lawsuit, the parties agreed to conditional certification, and the court approved notice to MWD Operators paid on a salary or day rate basis. Jack Siegel, with co-counsel, represented the workers.
This was a stipulated order: the workers and the defendants, BlueStar Directional, LLC and an individual defendant, filed a joint stipulation and proposed order and asked the court to approve it by signing it. A United States District Judge signed it on June 9, 2016.
The parties said they reached their agreement “To preserve resources and in the interest of judicial economy”. Under the stipulation, the judge’s signature made the case a conditionally certified collective action under 29 U.S.C. § 216(b). The parties also agreed that the notice and consent form were timely, informative, and accurate.
The stipulation kept both sides’ claims and defenses in place, and the defendants continued to deny that they had violated the FLSA in any respect. BlueStar Directional, LLC, which the stipulation called a holding company, also denied that it was properly named in the suit.
Who was in the group. In close paraphrase, the order covered all MWD Operators who currently or formerly worked for the defendants, who were classified as employees, and who were paid on a salary and/or day rate basis. The time period ran from three years before the date the order was signed. The court-approved notice described the group as MWD Operators who worked for BlueStar Directional between April 2013 and the present.
Notice terms. Under the signed stipulation:
As general information, MWD stands for measurement while drilling. The court-approved notice explained that the lawsuit claimed these MWD Operators were paid a salary and/or flat day rate, were directed to work over 40 hours per workweek, and did not receive overtime pay for that work.
The notice also spoke to workers who had signed up as contractors, stating: “You have this right even if you agreed to work as an independent contractor.” It told workers that it was unlawful for the defendants or a current employer to fire them or take adverse action because they took part, a topic covered in our guide to protection from retaliation for joining an overtime case.
The tolling term also mattered, because under the FLSA each worker’s time limit keeps running until that worker’s written consent is filed. By providing that the clock would pause for any late employee list, the order kept a slow list from eating into workers’ claims.
Conditional certification is an early step, and it is not a finding that the defendants did anything wrong. Here the defendants agreed to it while denying the claims, and the court did not decide the merits.
The Fair Labor Standards Act requires employers to pay non-exempt workers time and a half for hours over 40 in a workweek. As general information, a day rate is a flat amount paid for each day worked, and it does not by itself remove the right to overtime. Under a Department of Labor rule (29 C.F.R. § 778.112), a non-exempt day-rate worker’s regular rate is the week’s day-rate pay divided by all hours worked. The worker is then owed half that rate again for each hour over 40.
Being paid a salary does not by itself make a worker exempt either. The white-collar exemptions also require specific job duties, which is why pay method alone rarely settles the question. Learn more about salaried vs. hourly pay and overtime.
In an FLSA collective action, each worker must opt in by filing a written consent. Because the parties agreed in this 2016 case, the court did not have to rule on whether the MWD Operators were similarly situated, although at the time federal courts in Texas commonly used a two-step approach with a lenient first step for conditional certification. Some federal appeals courts have since changed this approach — the Fifth Circuit in Swales v. KLLM Transport Services (2021) and the Sixth Circuit in Clark v. A&L Homecare & Training Center (2023). Swales now governs federal courts in Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi.
This page describes a 2016 court order. The time to join that collective was set by the court in that case. If you have worked in a similar role, the Siegel Law Group can evaluate your own claims.
Did you work as an MWD Operator, paid a salary or a flat day rate, and often work more than 40 hours a week without overtime pay? A lawyer can review how you were paid, even if your employer called you something else.
Contact the Siegel Law Group for a free consultation.
Related rulings: Leiker v. Blue Star Directional, another Southern District of Texas case for MWD Operators.
Some do, because federal law ties the overtime right to exemption status rather than to the way a paycheck is calculated. An MWD operator who earns a salary or a flat day rate, and who does not fall under an exemption, is entitled to overtime at 150 percent of the regular rate for each hour beyond forty. The answer for any one operator turns on the pay records and the duties actually performed.
For a non-exempt employee, the Department of Labor starts by totaling the week’s day-rate earnings and dividing that sum by every hour worked, which produces the regular rate. Each hour beyond forty then earns an additional half of that figure on top of the day-rate pay already received. Paying only the flat daily amount, with no added half-time for hours beyond forty, does not meet this rule.
No. In Meyer v. Blue Star Directional, the stipulation said the defendants continued to deny that they had violated the FLSA in any respect, and it preserved every claim and defense on both sides. BlueStar Directional, LLC, described there as a holding company, also denied that it was properly named in the suit. The judge signed the stipulation without deciding the merits.
Some orders build in a safeguard against delay by the employer. Here, the order set a deadline of 15 business days for the employee list, and every day of delay past that point would pause the limitations clock through equitable tolling. That way, a late list could not shrink the time the MWD Operators had to assert their claims. Courts decide case by case whether to include a term like this.
The Siegel Law Group is a national overtime and wage law firm devoted entirely to representing workers denied overtime pay. Where many firms include wage cases as a small part of a broader employment practice, the Siegel Law Group has built its entire practice around overtime litigation — and the results reflect that commitment: $100M+ recovered for workers, 50+ class and collective action certifications, and 100+ federal lawsuits filed in 27+ federal courts nationwide. Founding attorney Jack Siegel is a Bloomberg BNA contributing author on wage and hour law.
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