Nurses Sue Over ‘Wage Theft’ at Pendleton, Roseburg Hospitals

A nurses union that represents over 500 workers at hospitals in Roseburg and Pendleton OR is suing their employer over what they call inaccurate wage reporting and wage theft.

  The lawsuit accuses the company of 'stealing' workers' hours and wages

The Oregon Nurses Association, the largest nursing union in the state, has filed a lawsuit against CommonSpirit Health concerning wage issues. While the suit directly affects the Roseburg and Pendleton workers, the ONA says any other union member who has experienced similar issues with CommonSpirit can join this expanded class-action suit.

According to information released by the ONA on Wednesday, March 8th,  CommonSpirit experienced a major data breach in October 2022 that not only compromised hundreds of workers but shut down most IT functions including wage reporting.

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Following the breach, the ONA says CommonSpirit began to intentionally underreport and underpay nurses, even claiming they overpaid some workers and demanded they refund as much as $2,000. There were dozens of similar wage-related issues reported to CS, according to the ONA.

According to the ONA:

 "Instead of providing proof of alleged overpayments, CommonSpirit illegally withheld workers’ earnings from future paychecks. This resulted in nurses receiving less pay than they earned including one Mercy nurse getting paid $0 after working 67 hours in a pay period."

The ONA also said:

"Nurses have been asking CommonSpirit to address its wage theft and inaccurate payments since November. In December, more than 370 ONA nurses and health care workers at Mercy Medical Center and St. Anthony Hospital delivered a signed petition to hospital management demanding CommonSpirit provide documentation of alleged overpayments."

The ONA says because of the lack of action on these and other issues, they have had to resort to legal action. This suit affects at least 500 workers employed at the two facilities.

The ONA also says:

"Plaintiffs estimate CommonSpirit may owe workers as much as $200,000 in unpaid or improperly withheld wages and CommonSpirit could face up to $800,000 in statutory penalties and damages."

The union also reported CommonSpirit is facing multiple class-action lawsuits from workers who say the company failed to take the necessary precautions to safeguard their online data and information related to the data breach.