Quality of life issues have become a hot button issue for workers in the video game industry, with big publishers like EA and Activision having already faced employee lawsuits over overtime. You wouldn't expect to hear of similar complaints in the retail community, however.

Leading video game retailer GameStop, which merged with Electronics Boutique last year, has apparently had a collective-action lawsuit issued against it in Louisiana. Court records indicate that six store managers have alleged that they were declared exempt from overtime regulations of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), which they contend should not have happened. The employees said that they were often required to work more than 50-60 hours per week. They are seeking damages with interest to compensate them for their overtime work, as well as payment for their attorneys' fees.

The FLSA indicates that those "employed in a bona fide executive, administrative, or professional capacity" are exempt from its overtime regulations. Nevertheless, the six store managers don't believe they fall into that exempt category.

"All store managers are required to follow, in precise detail, the store operations manual which dictates the procedure for operation of the retail establishment. ... The job of store manager requires virtually no actual management of employees or exercise of discretionary function," the suit partially reads.

Furthermore, to emphasize how they don't belong in the exempt category, the managers said that GameStop was responsible for things like pricing decisions, how much to pay the store staff, what/how much to stock and where to place them on shelves, and how they would be promoted. Managers, according to the suit, weren't even given the power to hire or fire their own employees—district managers controlled that aspect.

The managers claim that GameStop violated the FLSA not only in their cases, but for GameStop managers across the U.S. As such, the six exmployees would like the court to allow other managers who have been affected by this since April 2003 to opt into the collective-action lawsuit.

Thus far GameStop's response to the suit has been to ask the judge to throw the case out because it's similar to another pending lawsuit filed against Electronics Boutique in 2004. The EB case was filed on behalf of all employees who were denied minimum wages or overtime pay since 1998. That suit also alleges that EB violated New York labor laws. There's a chance that suit could be moved to the same court as the GameStop case. However, the New York suit may be reaching a settlement and the judge in the Louisiana suit has not yet made a decision on GameStop's request to throw it out.

Source: GameSpot