A national collective action has been filed in Florida against home loan specialist, Mortgage Investors Corporation. The action is brought on behalf of all current and former Mortgage Investors loan officers who, since June, 2001, were not paid proper statutory overtime for all hours worked beyond 40 per week and/or proper minimum wage for all hours worked. The action is brought under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act and seeks back pay, compensatory, statutory and liquidated damages as well as declaratory and injunctive relief. As a collective action, all potential claimants are required to "opt-in" to the action in order to be considered part of the class. The employees have requested that the court issue notice to all potential class members.

According to the loan officers, Mortgage Investors has engaged in a willful and intentional course of action to defraud them of proper overtime and minimum wage compensation. The loan officers claim that Mortgage Investors frequently requires them to work well in excess of 40 hours per week. However, according to the loan officers, the company has no provisions in place to properly compensate them for these hours. Additionally, the loan officers claim that they were paid under a straight commission system, and thus were often not paid basic minimum wage. Under the Fair Labor Standards Act, all "non-exempt" employees are entitled to a minimum of time and a half for all hours worked in excess of 40 per week, as well as minimum wage for all hours worked. "Non-exempt" employees are generally those that work on an hourly basis and do not have managerial or executive responsibility. While the employees bringing this action have been classified as "exempt" by Mortgage Investors, they claim that they are in reality "non-exempt" and therefore entitled to receive overtime and minimum wage compensation for all hours worked beyond 40 per week. The loan officers also claim that because Mortgage Investors' refusal to pay overtime was willful and intentional, they are entitled to an equal amount of liquidated damages. Mortgage Investors operates office locations in Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia and Washington. In some locations they operate as Amerigroup Mortgage Corporation. It is estimated that the potential class easily numbers in the hundreds, and perhaps the thousands.