Restaurants in Oregon illegally withheld tips from workers and even let managers take some, the DOL says

• An Oregon restaurant chain withheld tips from workers and let managers take a portion, the DOL said.
• KKOKI Korean BBQ's three restaurants also violated labor laws on overtime pay, the DOL said.

A restaurant chain in Oregon withheld tips from workers and even allowed managers to take a portion, the US Department of Labor (DOL) said.

KKOKI Korean BBQ also only paid overtime to staff when they worked at least 86 hours per pay period and didn't keep accurate employee records, the DOL said in a press release Monday.

The DOL said it recovered almost $170,000 for 118 workers at the three branches of KKOKI in Portland, Eugene, and Salem.

Millions of restaurant workers quit their jobs during the pandemic because of low wages, lack of benefits, and poor working conditions.

The DOL warned that violations like this could make companies' labor shortages worse.

"As we've seen, the pandemic has prompted many restaurant industry workers to find employment that better suits their needs and find jobs with employers who will pay them all the wages they have earned," Carrie Aguilar, district director of the DOL's Wage and Hour Division in Portland, said in a statement.

The Wage and Hour Division recovered $34.7 million in back wages for more than 29,000 employees across the US in 2021, the DOL said.

"Restaurant industry workers are paid some of the country's lowest wages, yet many put themselves at risk throughout the pandemic to serve their customers and help employers keep their businesses open,"Aguilar added.

The DOL told Insider that KKOKI required servers to give 30% of their tips to back-of-house staff and that the Salem location didn't give all the tips collected in the tip pool to all employees. At the Eugene location, managers were also included in the staff's tip pool, the DOL said.

Employers are not allowed to keep staff's tips "under any circumstances," the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) stipulates. And managers and supervisors are only allowed to keep tips that they receive from customers directly for services that they directly and "solely" provides, per the act.

Workers should also be paid an overtime premium for hours worked over 40 a week, under the FLSA.

The DOL said it recovered $84,864 in back wages for staff and the same amount in liquidated damages. It also fined the restaurant group $30,199 because of "the willful nature of the employer's violations," it said.

KKOKI did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment, made outside of normal working hours.