Eric Su is a partner in Crowell & Moring’s Labor & Employment Group in the firm’s New York office. His practice mainly involves representing management in all aspects of labor and employment law, including government investigations and class and collective action litigation defense involving alleged violations of the Fair Labor Standards Act, and parallel state wage and hour laws. Eric has routinely handled investigations by federal and state labor departments, law enforcement, and municipal agencies concerning wage and hour issues including, but not limited to, compliance with the Davis-Bacon Act (and Related Acts), Service Contract Act, and state “little Davis Bacon” and other prevailing wage or similar laws (e.g. New York Real Property Tax Law 421-a and New York Wage Parity Act).
He also counsels clients in all facets of workplace issues including, but not limited to, day-to-day human resources matters, implementation of workplace policies, rules, and practices concerning restrictive covenants, paid time off, medical and family leave, workplace harassment, discrimination and harassment, alternative dispute resolution, “ban-the-box” and background checks, employee/contractor classification, and employee overtime exemption status. He is experienced in counseling employers on investigations involving allegations of employee and management misconduct and fraud, workplace harassment, employee disloyalty, and other workplace issues.
He further advises employers on litigation prevention and counsels them on all aspects of the employment relationship, including compliance with all aspects of statutory and regulatory requirements. Such efforts include leading comprehensive and nationwide audits of large corporate clients’ employment practices, employee classification, and wage and hour compliance. His emphasis on compliance with employment laws and regulations have led to many successful results for his clients before federal and state administrative investigations and in federal and state courts. He has obtained numerous favorable results for his clients in dealing with investigations by the federal and state departments of labor and has successfully resolved labor department investigations in lieu of criminal charges being brought by prosecutorial authorities.
Eric is fluent in Mandarin Chinese.
Representative Matters
- Negotiated plea agreements for clients in the hospitality and construction industries in numerous joint investigations by the Labor Bureau of the New York State Office of the Attorney General and the U.S. Department of Labor.
- Achieved numerous wage and hour class and collective action settlements for national restaurant chains involving federal and state “dual job” and “80/20” rules and off the clock issues.
- Successfully obtained decisions denying class certification in two lawsuits pending before the New York State Supreme Court involving allegation of underpayment of prevailing wages for labor furnished in connection with various housing projects.
- Successfully resolved a class action involving allegation of underpayment of prevailing wages for a Fortune 100 company.
- Resolved a U.S. Department of Labor wage and hour investigation concerning a federal contractor's compliance with the Service Contract Act, in which the government's initial underpayment determination was close to $2.0 million and through reverse audit and extensive negotiations, the finding was reduced to less than $50,000.
- Resolved numerous New York City Department of Consumer Affairs investigations regarding compliance with the New York Earned Sick and Safe Time Act and minimized penalty assessments against the employer respondents.
- Significantly reduced a New York Department of Labor minimum wage and overtime audit against a restaurant from $1.4 million to $190,000.
- Achieved settlement with trustees of a union fringe benefit fund for a contractor client in a federal lawsuit in which the fund trustees sought to collect underpayment of fringe benefit contributions of over $2 million, but the matter was settled for approximately $45,000 after two days of trial.
- Resolved a New York State Department of Labor prevailing wage investigation against a contractor in which the initial underpayment assessment was over $2 million and resulted in the reduction of the assessment to approximately $500,000.
- Resolved a U.S. Department of Labor minimum wage and overtime investigation against a restaurant by reducing the government's initial underpayment finding of $240,000 to $80,000.
- Represented a contractor in a prevailing wage investigation by the Office of the Comptroller of the City of New York wherein the investigation resulted in a finding of no underpayment owed.
- Resolved ten simultaneous investigations by the New York State Department of Labor against a contractor for alleged underpayment of prevailing wages and falsification of payroll documents which resulted in the reduction of the initial aggregate underpayment finding of over $1.5 million to $300,000.
- Successfully resolved numerous administrative debarment proceedings against public works contractors before federal and state departments of labor.
- Successfully resolved numerous audits, investigations, and other administrative proceedings commenced by New York State Department of Labor in which the government alleged that the client sought to collect unpaid withholding taxes and unemployment, workers compensation, disability insurance premiums, and related penalties assessed as a result of alleged misclassification of workers as independent contractors by clients from various industries, including retail, hospitality, construction, and information technology.
- Obtained an arbitration award of more than $55 million for unpaid change order work on behalf of a contractor against a hotel developer.
- Successfully litigated and negotiated delay, extra work, or change order claims on behalf of contractors performing public improvements.
Affiliations
Admitted to practice: New York, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
Professional Activities and Memberships
- American Bar Association
- New York State Bar Association
Speeches & Presentations
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"Navigating Enforcement Activity Regarding Wage Parity Act Compliance in the Home Health Industry," Crowell & Moring Breakfast Seminar, New York, NY
(June 20, 2019).
Presenters: Kelly T. Currie, Brian McGovern, Rebecca Monck Ricigliano, and Eric Su.
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