You can expect an unparalleled track record for defending class action employment claims, combined with responsive, efficient service and creative legal defense skills.

Deep experience in all types of employment litigation. Our large team of labor and employment attorneys has broad litigation experience, making us well equipped to defend any type of employment litigation—effectively and creatively.

Our attorneys have successfully defended class action cases in trial and appellate courts involving issues such as:

• Race discrimination
• National-origin discrimination
• Wage and hour claims
• Equal-pay claims
• Age discrimination
• Sex discrimination
• Disability discrimination and accommodation
• ERISA and breach-of-fiduciary duty claims

Our clients represent a wide array of industries, including consumer products, health care, publishing, retail, manufacturing, logistics and financial services.

We have particular strength in the following areas:

Wage & Hour Class and Collective Actions

Routine employment claims now portend six-figure liability, while class claims can easily result in millions of dollars of exposure. Even informed personnel choices can spawn lawsuits, and too often the outcome is shaped by claimants looking for a deep pocket and sympathetic juries who view employers as presumptively guilty.

Today, more than ever, management needs skilled and experienced legal counsel to identify risk early and find creative ways to contain and eliminate it. Over the last 15 years, as the number of wage and hour class and collective actions has multiplied exponentially, our attorneys have developed deep experience in these types of cases.

Our team is results oriented, and our goal is to resolve and dispose of wage and hour problems and claims as quickly and efficiently as possible, consistent with our clients’ business objectives. We are not interested in prolonging litigation, but rather in managing it in a way that serves our clients’ goals and best interests. And, in those cases in which we must go to trial, we possess the jury-trial experience, substantive law knowledge and resources to win. We work collaboratively with our clients in making every strategic decision; after all, it is their business and money at risk.

We believe every class action case is unique and that staffing decisions should be made on a case-by-case basis that depend on the particular facts and claims involved.

Employment Discrimination Class Actions

The firm’s employment practice is comprised of a strong concentration in equal employment opportunity/discrimination law and enjoys a well-known reputation for excellence in discrimination law compliance and defense. Our litigation experience includes large-class employment discrimination cases at the administrative, trial court and appellate levels (both state and federal), including the U.S. Supreme Court. Our attorneys counsel and defend clients of all sizes, in race, national origin, sex, age, disability, sexual harassment and other employment discrimination matters and have successfully litigated cases in bench trials and before juries. 

Whether ensuring an expeditious and prudent strategy at the initial administrative stages of an EEO investigation or defending against class-wide claims affecting thousands of employees, Vedder Price employment attorneys have earned the firm a national reputation for excellence in discrimination law compliance and defense.

California PAGA and Business & Professions Code Representative Actions

Vedder Price attorneys have litigated a wide range of California state law claims involving overtime, pay statements, meal and rest periods, and other issues covered by California’s Private Attorney General Act (PAGA).

Our team also has experience with California’s Unfair Competition Law, Business & Professions Code Section 17200. This statute was designed to protect consumers from fraudulent, unfair and illegal business practices and false advertising, and these class actions often involve large monetary awards.

Our team handles lawsuits in both the California state and federal court systems including class and collective actions, arbitrations and administrative agency matters.

ERISA and Breach of Fiduciary Duty Actions

Since the passage of ERISA, the firm has represented clients in connection with the extensive body of case law interpreting ERISA and related employee benefits issues. Vedder Price regularly advises clients on the procedures for handling claims and litigation strategies in anticipation of trial considerations. Our ERISA litigation attorneys are not just subject matter experts who have never seen a courtroom. Our team is a highly trained group of attorneys with crossover litigation skills, coupled with substantive experience in all aspects of ERISA law. 

The firm’s ERISA litigation team has deep bench strength with significant experience in high-stakes class action and multiparty litigation, and we are one of a very few firms in the country that has successfully tried an ERISA class action case. The firm’s practice is national in scope and our team has won several leading cases in the employee benefits field, including two Supreme Court cases as well as dozens of important cases in the courts of appeal and federal district courts across the country. 

We have handled many ERISA disputes, including those involving plan amendments and terminations, alleged breaches of fiduciary duty, federal preemption, ERISA plan status, retiree health claims and benefits cutback litigation. While the firm prides itself on its successful record in multimillion-dollar, complex litigation, we handle all disputes efficiently and economically, frequently winning cases at the motion to dismiss and summary judgment stages.

Vedder Price’s ERISA litigation team engages in extensive thought leadership in this highly technical area, with several members of the group serving as co-chairs of various subcommittees for the American Bar Association’s Employee Benefits Subcommittee. Three members of our team have also served as part of the National Faculty for the ABA’s Institute for ERISA Litigation, a program designed to train other lawyers in this area. We also serve as authors and editors of various sections of Employee Benefits Law and ERISA Litigation (Bloomberg BNA), the leading treatises for this area of law.