Walmart could soon pay $65 million in a 9-year-old class action lawsuit over its lack of seating for cashiers.
Nisha Brown brought the suit in 2009, according to the Los Angeles Times, and 100,000 current and former California Walmart cashiers are eligible to receive part of the payout.
The onetime Walmart employees said the retailer violated a 2001 California wage order that determined that employees must be given “suitable seats when the nature of the work reasonably permits.”
Walmart, however, has maintained that the nature of the work as a cashier does not permit cashiers to sit down. Among its reasons, per the LA Times: cashiers need to move around to greet customers and look inside carts; cashiers are less efficient when they sit down; customers prefer standing cashiers; and providing seating to cashiers would lead to a loss of revenue.
The two sides in the case filed a proposed settlement this week, and a judge still has to approve the $65 million settlement amount.
As part of the settlement, Walmart would begin a “pilot program” providing stools to cashiers who request them and would agree not to retaliate against workers who choose to sit down.
“Both sides are pleased to have reached a proposed resolution and look forward to the court granting preliminary approval to the settlement,” Walmart spokesman Randy Hargrove told the LA Times.
The lawsuit is similar to one CVS lost over the same issue in 2016.
