According to the office of Democratic Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell, the Pittsfield-based company at the heart of her office’s investigation failed to pay wages both on time and at all, kept tips from workers, and failed to keep accurate records.
“The company is named Sunshine Cleaning Service. They also go by Soleil Personnel, and they provide janitorial cleaning services for a timeshare called Vacation Village, which is out in the Berkshires," said Jonah Berger, an investigator in the AG’s Fair Labor Division. “We received a complaint in spring 2024 from an individual who worked at the at the timeshare. She was someone who cleaned the rooms, and she believed that the company was taking tips from the rooms, tips that she was entitled to. There were also other allegations, including that employees were not allowed to take their lunches, and that they were unable to receive their first week of pay when they began employment.”
That was enough to open an investigation.
“We spoke to close to two dozen workers, and we were able to determine that those allegations we believe were true, and so we issued multiple citations, including a citation for retaliation, which means that the employer terminated three employees who had spoken up about conditions at the workplace,” Berger told WAMC.
Organized labor played a role in making sure Sunshine Cleaning’s misdeeds were exposed. The employee who blew the whistle on the situation first went to Western Massachusetts Labor Action, an organization dedicated to supporting low-income workers in the region.
“Western Mass Labor Action has really played an instrumental part throughout in helping us find other employees," said Berger. "For example, because, we're out of Boston, although we have regional offices in Springfield, New Bedford, and Worcester, and so we're not able to always be on the ground. And so these organizations are often able to help us get in touch with employees. In particular, in this instance, many of the employees were particularly vulnerable. Some of them were not, they didn't speak English, for example. And so having that that on the ground source of information can be really helpful, and oftentimes employees have organizations in their community that they trust.”
In total, the citations amount to almost $237,000: more than $167,000 in restitution and damages for workers and $69,500 in penalties.
“If an employee is a service worker, meaning that in this case, in the timeshare, there were customers leaving tips for them," explained Berger. "After the individual would leave the room at 10 or 11am they would leave, let's say, a $10 bill. And what was occurring was that the managers or someone were on behalf of the managers were going room to room taking the tips. And so, whether or not those employees are receiving what's called the service rate, which is as low as $6.75 an hour, in this case, the employees actually were making the minimum wage, so $15 an hour, they're still entitled to those tips.”
Berger estimates that the AG’s Fair Labor Division receives upwards of 6,000 wage theft complaints and around 10,000 hotline calls a year.
“That's obviously only probably a small percentage of the people in the commonwealth who are experiencing wage theft," he told WAMC. "We also deal with other issues, including child labor and other- Prevailing wage, for example, where, if an employer is seeking to get a public works project, for example, they have to bid for that, for that project. That's also work that we do. So, I think our purview is vast, but we obviously want folks to come to our office, even if they don't know necessarily if it's something that our office will take or if it's something that we're able to investigate, just let us know and we'll do our best to help them out.”
Sunshine Cleaning did not respond to a request for comment from WAMC.
