Labor & Employment Law Daily Wrap Up, WAGE-HOUR—CLASS ACTIONS—E.D. Pa.: Motor Carrier Act defense does not defeat class certification of UPS workers, (Dec 16, 2025)

By Todd Harrison, J.D.

Although the defense might raise some individual issues, it was not enough to prohibit the class certification of UPS warehouse workers whose claims concerned uncompensated time spent walking to work stations.

A proposed class of UPS workers satisfied Rule 23’s elements by a preponderance of evidence, leading a federal district court in Pennsylvania to certify the class. The workers labor across 10 UPS warehouse facilities and are not compensated from the time that they leave a guard station to the time that they arrive at their designated work station. UPS asserted a defense under the Motor Carrier Act (MCA). The court found that determining which employees engaged in MCA-exempt work and to what extent—even if doing so involves individualized factual inquiries—was not sufficient to overcome the many other questions that can be resolved on a class-wide basis (Malone v. United Parcel Service, Inc., No. 2:21-cv-03643-JDW (E.D. Pa. Dec. 12, 2025)).

Project Plissken. UPS operates more than 70 facilities across Pennsylvania. In the second half of 2021, it implemented what it refers to as “Project Plissken” in the state. The goal behind Project Plissken was to start tracking, and paying, UPS employees for the time they spent walking through and undergoing security checks before and after entering certain facilities. UPS determined that 10 facilities fell within the scope of the project, meaning those facilities had security guards that screened employees upon entry to or exit from the building.

Employees are required to “badge in” when they enter the guard shack, walk through, and then “badge out” when they exit the guard shack. After employees exit the guard shacks, they enter the building through a designated employee entrance. Once inside the building, employees walk to their designated work area.

The Plissken facilities are large warehouses, with one measuring nearly 800,000 square feet. Thus, many employees must walk a significant distance between the employee entrance and their work area. UPS does not pay employees for the time spent walking between the guard shack and their work area. Once employees reach their work area, they clock in. At the end of their shift, they clock out at their work area, which may differ from their starting point. UPS does not pay the employees after they clock out.

Lawsuit. On August 16, 2021, the named plaintiff filed this lawsuit on behalf of himself and similarly situated UPS employees. He asserted that UPS violates the Pennsylvania Minimum Wage Act (PMWA) by failing to pay overtime wages associated with the time employees spend going through mandatory security screenings and walking to or from their reporting areas before and after shifts.

The named plaintiff moved to certify a class on January 19, 2024. In response, UPS made clear that it intended to assert an affirmative defense based on an overtime exception under the PMWA that mirrors a FLSA exemption for employees whom the MCA exempts.

After others joined as plaintiffs, they sought certification for a class of hourly-paid warehouse workers, defined as hourly-paid employees excluding those whose work involved performing as a driver, driver’s helper, or auto mechanic. The court here considered the motion for class certification.

Ascertainability. First, the court addressed whether the proposed class was ascertainable. As to which warehouse workers should be included in the proposed class, the plaintiffs clarified that they were those who are “inside employees within UPS’s system…” Thus, the court revised the definition of “warehouse workers” to refer only to those employees who work inside a UPS warehouse.

UPS has timekeeping records that would permit the plaintiffs to determine who is in the class based on objective criteria, observed the court. Although this might prove to be tedious exercise when it comes to identifying certain subsets of employees, the court nonetheless found that it could be done.

Although UPS contended that the class definition captures employees who may be subject to its MCA defense, the “presence of a defense for certain class members does not affect ascertainability,” said the court. If anything, continued the court, any concerns about the MCA defense bear on the predominance inquiry, not ascertainability.

“Because the class is defined with reference to objective criteria, and UPS’s timekeeping records provide a reliable and administratively feasible mechanism for determining who falls within the class, the class is ascertainable,” concluded the court on this point.

Numerosity. Turning to the numerosity requirement, the plaintiffs first came forward with evidence that there were approximately 17,000 employees in the putative class. Since then, they have revised the class definition to exclude those who entered into arbitration agreements with UPS. Nevertheless, UPS has not contested numerosity and the court, noting that the plaintiffs seek to represent a class of warehouse employees who worked across 10 facilities over seven years, had little trouble concluding this requirement was met.

Commonality. As to the commonality requirement, the court found that there were common questions of whether time spent walking through the Plissken facilities’ guard shacks and walking from the employee entrance to the nearest time clock and back again was compensable under the PMWA.

In addition, the plaintiffs made it clear that they were seeking to recover unpaid wages only for “the time it takes to walk the most direct, shortest distance between the security check and their reporting areas,” obviating any concerns that their calculations would include time employees may have spent socializing before and after their shifts.

In addressing UPS’s argument that employees’ use of cellphones for personal reasons during their time spent walking from a building’s entrance to and from their reporting areas would pose a commonality problem, the court noted that the PWMA specifically designates all time during which an employee is required to be on the premises as compensable hours worked, regardless of whether the employee was performing job-related duties. Thus, the court found no issue with the commonality requirement.

Typicality. Next, the court considered the typicality requirement. Here, the court found the plaintiffs’ claims were typical because they arose from the same legal theories as the claims of the class. UPS violated the PWMA by: (1) failing to pay its warehouse workers for time spent going through security screenings (prior to December 5, 2021); and (2) failing to pay warehouse workers for time spent walking the shortest distance between the facility entrance and their reporting areas before and after their shifts.

Adequacy. With regard to the adequacy requirement, the court found plaintiffs’ counsel more than adequate. It also concluded the plaintiffs were adequate class representatives. Although UPS contended that the plaintiffs were inadequate because they did not have the same job categories as other class members, UPS also stated that job categories do not define the work that a particular class member performed. UPS cannot have it both ways, explained the court and, in any event, this argument did not impact the plaintiffs’ adequacy to litigate over UPS’s overtime practices.

Predominance. On the question of predominance, the court noted that the plaintiffs have demonstrated that they can prove the elements of their claims on a class-wide basis. Further, the plaintiffs can establish the amount of hours they worked and the corresponding wages they are due using a combination of UPS’s timekeeping records and the plaintiffs’ expert analysis, said the court.

None of the issues raised by UPS altered this outcome, explained the court. Although it might be true that different facilities have different screening protocols, this fact does not alter the common nature of the analysis for those facilities. As to UPS’s argument that the plaintiffs cannot prove their claims with common evidence, the court was unmoved, noting that the plaintiffs’ focus on the shortest walking distance obviated most of this particular argument.

Most significantly, UPS contended that its MCA defense—and the individualized issues that it presents—will predominate. Here, UPS focused its argument on the issue of loaders. That is, those employees who are responsible for loading delivery trucks and package cars.

The “what.” To prove its employees are “loaders” as defined in the MCA, UPS must show that: (1) its employees perform the type of loading set forth in the MCA’s regulations; and (2) identify the employees who engaged in loading or reasonably could have expected to engage in loading.

The first inquiry—the “what”—can be answered on a class-wide basis, said the court. Questions as to how UPS employees load trucks or cars, why they load them the way they do, and whether they exercise any discretion when loading can all be answered on a class-wide basis, a fact conceded by UPS.

The “who.” As to the second prong of the MCA showing—the “who”—at least a portion of that question can be answered on a class-wide basis as well, observed the court. At summary judgment, the parties can argue about what it means for an employee to reasonably be expected to load, drive, or work as a driver’s helper or mechanic, and the court will be required to determine what the relevant test is. However, once that test is established, it will apply to everyone in the class, explained the court.

In addition, the court noted at least two reasons why the MCA defense does not defeat class certification at the predominance inquiry. First, UPS’s failure to keep complete/accurate records about its employees’ work activities has exacerbated the individualized nature of the inquiry in this particular case. Likewise, the employee tracking data UPS does employ fails to identify all employees who engaged in MCA-exempt work.

Given all of this, the court found that there is no generalized source of proof on which UPS can rely to prove which employees are exempt under the MCA. As a result, UPS would need to establish its defense as to each class member on an individual basis. However, the court noted that this was largely a problem of UPS’s making.

By incorporating the MCA exemption, the PMWA excuses UPS from having to pay overtime for those employees who fall within the exemption, explained the court. If UPS wants to take advantage of that exemption, then it must keep records necessary to determine which employees are exempt. If it does not want to keep those records, then it will have trouble asserting this defense. However, UPS’s choices when it comes to record keeping cannot thwart the plaintiffs’ request for class certification, said the court, and the individual inquiries that may result from UPS’s assertion of the MCA defense in this case was not sufficient to defeat class certification.

Superiority. With regard to the superiority requirement, UPS left this factor uncontested asserting that if predominance was not established, than this factor failed as well. However, because common issues predominate and the individual issues that arise from the MCA do not defeat superiority for the same reasons they do not defeat predominance, this factor was met, concluded the court, certifying the class.

The case is No. 2:21-cv-03643-JDW.

Judge: Wolson, J.

Attorneys: Peter D. Winebrake (Winebrake & Santillo) for Michael Malone. Brenna D. Kelly (DLA Piper) for United Parcel Service, Inc.

Companies: United Parcel Service, Inc.

Cases: WageHour ClassActions Overtime WorkingTime StateLawClaims PennsylvaniaNews GCNNews