Bosh’s Former Driver Sues for Overtime Pay Violations

Chris Bosh’s former driver is suing him for violating overtime law. Michael Ray, the former driver, alleges that the NBA star failed to pay him overtime that he was due after moving to Austin, Texas in the summer of 2018.

In a federal lawsuit that Michael Ray filed in Austin, Texas, he claimed he started work as Bosh’s driver when the NBA player and his family were residents of the state of California. According to the lawsuit filed by Ray there were five people employed in the Bosh family home. Two were household managers. Two were employed to maintain the yard and the exterior of the home. And the fifth was Michael Ray himself, employed as Bosh’s driver.

 While the family was living in California, Ray claims that Bosh paid him by the hour and did not usually require any overtime hours. But on the rare occasion that Ray did put in overtime hours at Bosh’s request, he was paid overtime wages for the hours worked. This changed in July 2018 when Chris Bosh moved with his family to Austin, Texas. In the process of the move, Bosh cut back on his staff and placed his driver, Michael Ray, on a fixed salary.

At this point, Ray claims his duties were expanded to include more household duties, including unpacking boxes from the family’s move from California to Texas, putting together new furniture ordered for the new household, taking out the garbage, and supervising contractors and pest control workers while they were working on the Bosh property. According to the suit, Ray was also required to run errands for the family. For instance, he was required to go the pharmacy, the grocery store, pick up food ordered from restaurants, etc. The additional duties increased Ray’s working hours to over 70 hours per week.

Ray claims, despite the drastic increase in hours and obvious overtime, Bosh refused to provide him with any overtime pay. According to Ray, Bosh declined to provide him with overtime pay because Ray was on a salary and Bosh insisted that as that was the case, Bosh could require he work as many hours as necessary. Ray claims that within days of raising the issue of overtime pay, Bosh terminated his employment. Ray, who is now back in California, is seeking unpaid wages, reinstatement of his job and other damages.

If you have been denied overtime pay or if you need to discuss what constitutes an overtime pay violation, please get in touch with one of the experienced employment law attorneys at California’s Blumenthal Nordrehaug Bhowmik De Blouw LLP.