loanDepot lawsuit alleges poor work circumstances for workers

Mortgage lender loanDepot just lately turned the goal of a lawsuit filed by a gaggle of former California staff who’ve complaints concerning the firm’s work circumstances.  

The lawsuit was filed on December 23 within the Superior Court docket of the State of California for the County of Orange by about 40 former loanDepot staff, together with mortgage officers, processors, underwriters, loss mitigation and foreclosures specialists.

The group is accusing the corporate of failing to pay minimal and extra time wages; present meal and relaxation durations; reimburse work-related bills; present correct wage statements; pay wages upon termination; or keep data of hours labored and earned.  

A consultant for loanDepot stated the corporate “declines to remark as a result of pending litigation.” 

loanDepot is the seventh-largest mortgage lender within the nation, in line with Inside Mortgage Finance’s rankings. The corporate produced $47.4 billion within the first 9 months of 2022, a decline of 56% in comparison with the identical interval in 2021, IMF exhibits.  

One of many lender’s focuses was to chop prices within the 2022 shrinking mortgage market. The corporate laid off hundreds of staff final 12 months and briefly suspended the 401K match program efficient October 2022. 

“To remain robust, we should take each step out there to align our value construction to present and projected mortgage origination volumes,” loanDepot’s CEO Frank Martell wrote in an October e-mail despatched to staff. 

“With mortgage volumes down greater than 60% this 12 months, we’ve needed to considerably scale back our prices (staffing, third occasion/vendor, actual property, and so on.) accordingly. The corporate stays dedicated to treating these impacted in a good and compassionate manner,” he added.

The lawsuit, nevertheless, offers perception into the alleged work circumstances for workers remaining on the mortgage lender. In accordance with the doc, offering mortgage companies is “time delicate, rigorous and nonstop.”

Consequently, the previous staff have been “regularly prevented from taking well timed meal durations and relaxation breaks and weren’t relieved of all duties to take such breaks because of fixed work calls for and staffing shortages.” 

The lawsuit states that the corporate disregarded labor legal guidelines by prohibiting the previous staff from taking 30-minute meal durations for each 5 hours labored and 10-minute relaxation durations for each 4 hours labored. 

The previous staff declare they weren’t compensated for working whereas off the clock, nor have been they reimbursed for work bills, which have been primarily associated to utilizing their telephones whereas talking to supervisors, purchasers, and coworkers about loans in course of.  

The plaintiffs are demanding a jury trial and compensatory damages. 

In the meantime, loanDepot allowed a number of of the corporate’s prime executives to obtain beneficiant pay raises within the type of increased base salaries and bonuses in 2022 amid cost-cutting initiatives, which a number of staff instructed HousingWire was powerful to abdomen.

“The latest SEC submitting concerning the pay raises, your article and the e-mail concerning our 401(ok) match being suspended was an absolute kick within the enamel,” one longtime loanDepot staffer stated to HousingWire at the moment. “Many sad of us round right here.”