Opinion ID: 1926123
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Wages Paid Late vs. Unpaid Wages Pursuant to Section 626-A

Text: [¶ 11] The employees also contend that the motion court erred in dismissing their claims for unpaid wages, liquidated damages, and attorney fees under section 626-A by concluding that late wages were not unpaid wages. Section 626-A in effect at the time these cases were initiated stated: Any employer is liable to the employee or employees for the amount of unpaid wages and health benefits. Upon a judgment being rendered in favor of any employee or employees, in any action brought to recover unpaid wages or health benefits under this subchapter, such judgment includes, in addition to the unpaid wages or health benefits adjudged to be due, a reasonable rate of interest, costs of suit including a reasonable attorney's fee, and an additional amount equal to twice the amount of unpaid wages as liquidated damages. 26 M.R.S.A. § 626-A. Section 621 required that wages were to be paid by the employers on a weekly basis. See 26 M.R.S.A. § 621. [4] Therefore, the employees contend, as soon as a week passes without payment, such wages are unpaid under the statute, and a cause of action thus accrues for those wages, costs, attorney fees, and liquidated damages. Cf. Alie v. Nadeau, 93 Me. 282, 285, 44 A. 891, 891-92 (1899) (holding that a cause of action for unpaid wages accrues on each instance that the wages are not paid). [¶ 12] The right of the employee created by section 626-A is to sue to collect unpaid wages under this subchapter. 26 M.R.S.A. § 626-A. The term unpaid wages, however, is not explicitly defined in section 626-A, nor is it defined in section 621. It is appropriate, then, to look to the legislative scheme of which it is a part to ascertain the meaning of unpaid wages. See City of Rockland, 1998 ME 238, ¶ 5, 721 A.2d at 982. We have previously stated that unpaid wages under section 626-A [are] precisely what [are] owing when an employer does not pay an employee for work. Cooper v. Springfield Terminal Ry. Co., 635 A.2d 952, 955 (Me.1993). It is not disputed that, in the case of these employees, their wages were ultimately paid. [¶ 13] Pursuant to section 626, the right to collect or enforce an action for an unpaid wage accrues when an employer fails to pay an employee after termination of employment and upon that employee's demand for payment. See 26 M.R.S.A. § 626 (1988 & Supp.1999). Under section 626, [a]n employee leaving employment must be paid in full within a reasonable time after demand at the office of the employer where payrolls are kept and wages are paid. Id. The statute states further that [f]or the purposes of this subchapter, a reasonable time means the earlier of either the next day on which employees would regularly be paid or a day not more than 2 weeks after the day on which the demand is made. Id. [¶ 14] When the employee remains employed but asserts that some or all of his or her earned wages are unpaid, the right to sue to collect unpaid wages accrues if an employee is not paid on the employee's regularly scheduled payday, and the difference is not made up by the next regularly scheduled payday. See 26 M.R.S.A. § 621(2). [¶ 15] Thus, the statute reveals a legislative intent to allow a private litigant recourse against an employer for an unpaid wage only if: (1) the employee has been discharged, subsequently demands to be paid, and the employer refuses to do so, see 26 M.R.S.A. § 626; or (2) when that employer has failed to pay a current employee in full, if the employer fails to pay the amount withheld by that employee's next regularly scheduled payday, see 26 M.R.S.A. §§ 621, 626-A. [5] [¶ 16] The employees note that section 621 explicitly states that [t]his subsection shall not be construed to permit nonpayment or withholding of wages when due. 26 M.R.S.A. § 621(2). They argue that this language precludes a construction of the statute that allows employers to catch up on their payment of wages by the next pay period. We disagree. First, that sentenceif read the way that the employees contendwould obviate the language in section 621 requiring that employers make up late wages by the next payday. Second, if an employer pays all wages in full by the next pay period, although that employer is not subject to an employee's private right of action under section 626-A, nevertheless the employer is subject to a civil forfeiture brought by the Attorney General pursuant to the same section. Accordingly, a wage paid in full, but paid late, is not unpaid under section 621. The remedy for the enforcement of a late wage is the not insignificant civil forfeiture penalties that can be brought by the Attorney General. [6] Only if a wage remains unpaid beyond the time frames set out in sections 621(2) or 626 may an employee recover in a private right of action.