By Gerald L. Maatman, Jr., Kathryn Brown, and Olga A. Romadin
Duane Morris Takeaways: On September 24, 2026, Judge Christopher A. Boyko of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio granted Plaintiff’s motion for conditional certification of a proposed collective of workers alleging that time-rounding practices resulted in overtime violations in Garner v. Cleveland Clinic Foundation, Case No. 23-CV-2258 (N.D. Ohio Sept. 24, 2026). Judge Boyko found that Plaintiff had met her burden to show a strong likelihood that workers were similarly situated because she provided testimony, declarations, and an expert opinion that demonstrated that workers across multiple positions and facilities were all subject to the same non-neutral rounding policy. The opinion should be required reading for companies defending wage & hour claims in courts within the Sixth Circuit.
Case Background
Plaintiff Deborah Garner brought a putative class and collective action on behalf of herself and all other similarly situated on November 21, 2023. Plaintiff, a patient registrar and patient access specialist employed by Defendant, the Cleveland Clinic Foundation (“CCF”), alleged that CCF failed to pay non-exempt employees overtime at the statutory rate for all hours worked over forty, in violation of the Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”) as well as Ohio’s wage and hour laws. Plaintiff additionally claimed that CCF failed to pay all wages owed to workers due to improper rounding and/or editing of hours worked in Defendant’s timekeeping software, and failed to keep accurate time records. Id. at 1-2.
On January 5, 2024, Plaintiff filed an amended complaint as well as a motion asking the Court to facilitate notice to other similarly-situated potential plaintiffs, and the Court granted the motion after striking Plaintiff’s class claims.
The Court’s Ruling
Judge Boyko granted Plaintiff’s motion to facilitate notice to putative collective members on determining that there was a strong likelihood that the proposed collective members are similarly situated because the plaintiffs had met their burden to show that non-exempt hourly employees were all subject to the same rounding policies. Id. at 1. Plaintiffs provided declarations of 5 opt-in plaintiffs, deposition testimony, and an expert opinion regarding CCF’s rounding policies and practices. Id. at 1-2. Plaintiff’s expert testified that CCF’s “rounding practices worked against the employees nearly 80 percent of the time.” Id. at 20.
Defendant argued that the scope of the proposed class and the variety of positions involved gave rise to individualized questions and issues, but the Court was unconvinced. Id. The Court determined that this evidence was enough to have “shown the rounding practice applied broadly to all the non-exempt employees” and was in line with the U.S. Supreme Court’s express determination that representative evidence in collective actions is permissible. Id.
However, the Court, citing to Plaintiff’s evidence, which showed that about 17% of employees suffered no injury, concluded that they lacked standing and were not similarly situated because they could claim no injury under the FLSA. Id. at 21.
Defendants further argued that approximately 4.5% of CCF’s non-exempt hourly employees were subject to “flex rounding” or “quarter rounding” policies and were therefore not similarly situated because they were not subject to the general rounding policy at issue. The Court found that Defendant’s argument only supported Plaintiff’s argument that CCF had a system-wide rounding policy, and that it was not applied to “select employees or departments.” Id. at 22. The Court concluded that the evidence showed “a consistent, systemwide policy of rounding and that rounding heavily favored Defendant,” and therefore that Plaintiffs met their burden to show the putative collective was similarly situated, and granted Garner’s motion for a Court-facilitated notice.
Implications for Companies
In light of the opinion in Garner, companies with a workforce of non-exempt employees are well-advised to take stock of their timekeeping policies and practices, particularly when they operate multiple facilities and utilize timekeeping systems with rounding features. Federal courts in the Sixth Circuit scrutinize any such policies to determine whether putative collective action members are subject to the same practices, and the likelihood of plaintiffs meeting the “strong likelihood” standard is greater when such policies are generally applicable across the employer’s sites and positions. A strong defense often features a showing that a company’s timekeeping policies and practices vary by position, department, and facility, and may be pointed to in arguing that putative collective members are not similarly situated enough to warrant collective-wide treatment.