Boehringer Reps' Names in Back-Pay Class-Action Suit Will Be Known to Their Bosses

(MoneyWatch)  The Jan. 16 deadline has passed for Boehringer Ingelheim sales reps who want to join the class action suit against their employers for back pay.

The question now is, what will be the fate of current BI reps who have signed forms asking for back pay in the event that the plaintiffs win? It's an interesting issue because BI and its lawyers will get a complete list of names of all current reps who have signed on to sue their bosses.

Retaliating against those reps would be legally inadvisable, of course. But it's also easy to see that reps suing their current employer might get a "diplomatic" level of treatment from their company.

Employees or ex-employees had until Jan. 16 to get their "consent to sue" forms back to the plaintiffs' lawyers. The case involves whether BI reps deserve back pay for overtime work. BI had incorrectly classified reps as sales workers on commission or salaried managers. The court found they neither actually sold anything nor managed anything, and thus should have been paid back pay. Letters went out late last year to all potential current and former employees of BI who were at the company since 2005. If employees returned the form, they get a shot at their share of the payout if the verdict goes their way.

It is less clear, however, whether those returning the forms knew that their names would become public -- and thus visible to their bosses at BI. All the forms have been filed on the court's web site docket. There are 19 batches of forms, encompassing dozens if not hundreds of reps. The names on those forms are downloadable for all to see. You can find them by searching the "civil" database for case number 3:06-cv-01985-JBA at this web site.

The folks at Cafe Pharma are debating the merits of the suit. Comments are evenly divided between those who want their money and those who think it will be bad for the company. Here's one comment:

Overtime pay....what a joke. Do we have to pay back money from all of the times we have gone home early? How many times did the dipshits who brought this suit work until 5 on a Friday?

• BNET's previous coverage of the Boehringer Ingelheim overtime case:
• Boehringer Reps Get Legal Victory on Back Pay; Amgen, Serono Reps Could Be Affected
• Download a copy of the ruling here