Lovisa Lawsuit

Workers being underpaid, and forced to work long shifts with no breaks, in harsh conditions.

Sounds a bit like an Amazon warehouse or the sweatshops Nike shut down in the 1990s.

But no, this is what the Australian jewellery brand Lovisa has been accused of in a recent class action lawsuit lodged by more than 300 of its former staff members.

The lawsuit alleges that workers weren’t allowed to take any meal breaks or even toilet breaks during their shifts.

There wasn’t long enough off time between working shifts.

And workers were forced to buy and wear Lovisa’s products without compensation.

Lovisa also denied workers pay for overtime hours, meaning they were working for free if they were forced to stay overtime

And the company in some cases, even refused to pay employees minimum wage for their normal hours.

This is a company with a yearly revenue of nearly $700 million million per year.

It has no trouble paying its CEO Victor Herrero though, paying him nearly $30 million last year, making him one of Australia’s highest paid CEOs.

The company’s owner is billionaire Brett Blundy. He owns multiple companies and lives in Monaco.

These companies hire young, often teenage employees who don’t know their rights and can’t advocate for themselves.

Allowing these big companies to exploit young workers. To pay their employees less and give them less of their basic rights as workers.

Anything to lower their bottom line and increase profits right?

If you work at Lovisa or any other retail or fast food stores, the Retail and Fast Food Workers Union are here for you or you can still join the class action complaint.