More than 500 janitors to be rewarded for wage theft from Cheesecake Factory, many of them Latinos

From 2016 through 2018, Naxhili Perez and Yadira Santos worked as janitors at the Cheesecake Factory, a restaurant chain with 331 restaurants nationwide. At midnight,  while the majority of the world would be asleep, Perez and Santos would begin their regular shift, which would end in the morning. After working and cleaning for eight hours without a proper meal or rest break period, they were often not able to go home and were forced to stay extra hours, which they were not compensated for.

“My coworkers and I had to work long nights, cleaning the kitchen and the dining rooms of the restaurant. After working eight hours, we were unable to come home until the Cheesecake Factory kitchen manager conducted a walkthrough to review our work,” Perez said. 

These daily walkthroughs resulted in workers like Santos and Perez logging up to 10 hours of unpaid overtime each week. If the kitchen manager was unsatisfied with the janitorial results, janitors were given additional tasks that had to be completed before they were released for the day. “One time I recall staying two hours after my eight-hour shift and I wasn't paid for that time,” Santos said. “At that time, I had twins and two other smaller children. The wage theft that I experienced stole money and time away from my children.” 

The wage and hour violations occurred in eight Cheesecake Factory restaurants located in San Diego County and Orange County. During a press conference on Tuesday, eight years after the wage-theft violations investigation began in 2016, the California Labor Commissioner’s Office announced they reached a historical $1 million settlement against Cheesecake Factory Restaurants Inc. and two janitorial contractors for underpaying and robbing wages from 589 janitor workers across the various locations.

The California Labor Commissioner’s Office and the Maintenance Cooperation Trust Fund (MCTF), a janitorial industry watchdog organization based in Los Angeles that represented the janitors during the investigation, are looking for all of the company’s former janitors for settlement payments to be distributed. 

In Tuesday’s press conference, the California Labor Commissioner’s Office announced they were already in touch with approximately 60 former workers, many of whom had cooperated in the investigation, but they believe about 500 more may be eligible.

Yardenna Aaron, executive director at MCTF, described this case as a “historical settlement.” 

“It is the first-ever settlement of its kind impacting a client employer for a violation of this magnitude in this sector of the janitorial industry,” she said. “Through conversation with the workers, investigators with MCTF discovered multiple janitorial companies contracted and subcontracted by the Cheesecake Factory were committing wage theft. Through the investigation, we have identified more than 60 impacted workers with an additional 500 yet to be identified.” 

In this particular case, the Cheesecake Factory was classified as a “client employer" because, as the investigation states, the company did not hire the janitors directly but instead contracted with the Americlean Janitorial Services Corp. to clean its restaurants. Americlean, in turn, subcontracted the work in the eight southern California locations to Zully Villegas, doing business as Magic Touch Commercial Cleaning. Both Villegas and Americlean are no longer operating businesses. 

Even if the Cheesecake Factory or Americlean did not do the direct hiring of the janitors, all companies were found liable, especially the Cheesecake Factory, which, according to the Labor Commission, let these injustices happen in their restaurants. 

According to Assembly Bill 1897, a law that took effect on January 1, 2015, client employers who obtain labor from a subcontractor are responsible for their workplace violations. The law states that the client employer is to share with a labor contractor “all civil legal responsibility and civil liability for all workers supplied by that labor contractor for the payment of wages and the failure to obtain valid workers’ compensation coverage.” 

The $1 million settlement will be divided and paid by all three companies. The Cheesecake Factory’s share of the total amount is the highest among all three, with the company paying a total of $750,000. Following that, Americlean will be paying a total of $200,000 and Magic Touch, who managed the janitors directly, has paid $50,000 of the $1 million, according to the settlement agreement document. 

Although the settlement resulted in only a fourth of the original $4 million request from janitors and their lawyers, Perez is proud of herself and her coworkers. “We knew back then that our employer, Magic Touch Cleaning Commercial, was taking advantage. We knew that the Cheesecake Factory was ignoring this misconduct and letting it happen,” she said. “It took a lot of courage to speak out and share our stories with organizations like the MCTF and government authorities like the Labor Commissioner, but we decided to speak up and use our voices. We knew we were stronger working together. Wage theft is never OK, and I want other companies to know; if you let wage theft happen on your watch, there will be consequences.”

California Labor Commissioner Lilia García-Brower thanked the janitors present in Tuesday’s press conference for “taking the risk" when speaking out against the workplace injustices that they faced for years. 

She said this case had 15 professionals from the Labor Commissioner's office who helped with this investigation by evaluating records, talking to victims and going out in the field to investigate the alleged working conditions. “Bridging forward a legal action is not transactional; we don't talk about the years in between to conduct that investigation, particularly in an industry like the janitorial industry," she said. 

According to García-Brower, the state's janitorial industry is known to have rampant violations. “We have a large underground economy in the industry, which means that those employers that have no intentions of following the law design their businesses to avoid responsibility, which makes the job much harder once a worker files a claim for us to be able to evaluate and establish the legal standards required by the law, and that's why workers are so important,” she said.

Apart from the monetary compensation, the settlement also includes a formal apology to janitors from the janitorial companies contracted by the Cheesecake Factory. In addition, all Cheesecake restaurants in California are required to communicate, in writing, to their janitorial contractors all labor code requirements for the state of California. “With specific reference to laws concerning the state or local minimum wage, overtime wage, the obligation to pay for all hours actually worked beyond any scheduled hours, and meal and rest periods,” as stated in the final settlement agreement document.

Santos said she doesn’t want what happened to her to happen to other workers.  “We are workers and are valuable, and these injustices should never happen. We need to know our right to defend ourselves at work,” she said. “Even if you are documented or undocumented in this country, the law protects you." 

García-Brower said it is important for workers to come forward with work-related injustices, including working without regular meals and rest breaks or unpaid wages. "The fight does not stop today; it only continues,” she said.

Janitors who worked as janitors in the Cheesecake Factory restaurants between August 31, 2014 and August 31, 2017, in Brea, Irvine, Huntington Beach, Newport Beach, Mission Viejo, Escondido and San Diego are asked to call (619) 213-5260.