Burma Superstar Calls Labor Lawsuit ‘Frivolous,’ Former Employee Details TK Working Conditions

TK HOOK

In response to a lawsuit filed against Burma Superstar last week, spokesperson Nathan Ballard released a statement dismissing the allegations.

“This frivolous lawsuit is based on false allegations. Burma Superstar will be totally exonerated and will prevail in court,” the statement read.

Ballard also noted that Burma Superstar has provided health care to employees for six years, and that many have been with the restaurant since the three chains first opened.

The popular Bay Area chain issued this statement in response to a class-action lawsuit filed against it last week. Lawyers filing the suit claim to represent more than one-hundred former and current Burma Superstar workers.

In an interview with the Express, William Navarette — a plaintiff in the case and former dishwasher, kitchen helper, and cook for Burma Superstar — alleged numerous illegal payment and labor practices.

He said that he was ultimately paid less than minimum wage, didn’t earn state-mandated pay for “split shifts,” that Burma owners discouraged meal and bathroom breaks, had paychecks withheld, and that working conditions were “complete madness.”

He says he started working for the Alameda Burma Superstar in 2011. Shortly after he was hired, he also began to work some shifts at the Oakland location, and even Burma Love in San Francisco. Although it wasn’t standard practice for all employees to work at multiple locations, Navarette said many were asked by owner Desmond Tan cover shifts at his other restaurants.

Navarette says he worked ten hour days when he was initially hired by Burma Superstar. After receiving his first paycheck more than a month-and-a-half into the job, he says he was surprised, however, to see such a small amount, despite just six days off during this time period.

[Do we have specifics on the amount, how many hours he worked, what he was supposed to be paid and what the amount was?]

And he claimed that his paychecks dipped even lower when he switched to five days a week. His salary was $1000 every two weeks, much less than minimum wage, according to Jesse Newmark, an attorney for Centro Legal de la Raza, which is representing Navarette and others. [Again, can we get more specifics on this: How his hours fluctuated and how his pay corresponded? Without details, it’s unclear.]

Navarette says Burma Superstar never contacted him about fluctuations in his pay. “They didn’t explain it to us,” he said. “It would just happen.”

The plaintiffs also allege that Burma Superstar violated split-shift laws. In California, any time a minimum-wage employee’s schedule is interrupted by a non-paid, non-working period (except meal breaks), they’re supposed to be paid an hour’s worth of pay at minimum wage in addition to their normal earnings.

Navarette says he and “similarly situated” kitchen employees at Burma Superstar experienced twelve-hours days — four-and-a-half hours on the lunch shift, five-and-a-half hours on the dinner shift, and including two non-working hours in between.

“I would sit in the car,” Navarette said. “I couldn’t go to my house because it was too far away. It was lost time with my family.”

[Again, do we know what Navarette was earning, and whether he tecnnically qualified for split shift pay, etc?]

But a big piece of the case, according to Jesse Newmark, an attorney for Centro Legal de la Raza, is that many Burma Superstar workers were misclassified as salaried employees exempt from California wage-and-hour laws. Newmark said he believes the majority of the money owed to the plaintiffs will come as back wages from this misclassification.

In addition to the wage-and-hour claims, are complaints about working conditions and breaks.

For instance, Navarette said kitchen staff were expected to minimize bathroom breaks, for the sake of work flow, and take meal breaks on their own time. Navarette said kitchen workers were discouraged from taking breaks because of long customer lines — with waits extending up to two hours on certain days.

He also said eight workers were stuffed [his word or yours?] into the Burma Superstar kitchen in Oakland. “In the four years I was there, I never had ten minutes to just get some air,” Navarette said.

He added that the cramped kitchen was always at an insufferable [again, his words?] temperature due to the steam and vapor. “Once you walk into that kitchen, you’re not going to stop until you get to leave for the night,” Navarette said. He also pointed to oil scars on his arms. “It was complete madness.”

Navarette also detailed what he described as a “third shift” at the Oakland Burma Superstar from 10:30 PM to 6:30 AM. Some workers—mostly those who didn’t work the previous shift—would come in after the restaurant shut its doors for the night to prepare food for Tan’s other Burmese cuisine destinations.

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For instance, he claimed that Burma Superstar owner Desmond Tan operates he five restaurants, which were named in the lawsuit — the three Burma Superstar locations, and also Burma Love and B Star — as a joint enterprise.

Tan is only listed as the owner of the San Francisco Burma Superstar and B Star, while the other restaurants are held by what Centro Legal de la Raza—one of the three legal organizations that filed the lawsuit—believes are his lawyer, Mazen Salfiti, and accountant, Jenny Su.

Attorneys at Centro Legal de la Raza, which helped file the suit, believe that Tan issued checks from the same system for employees across all five of the restaurants.

For instance, he claimed that Burma Superstar owner Desmond Tan
operates he five restaurants, which were named in the lawsuit — the three Burma Superstar locations, and also Burma Love and B Star — as a joint enterprise.

Tan is only listed as the owner of the San Francisco Burma Superstar and B Star, while the other restaurants are held by what Centro Legal de la Raza—one of the three legal organizations that filed the lawsuit—believes are his lawyer, Mazen Salfiti, and accountant, Jenny Su.

Tan opened B Star and Burma Love as higher-end Burmese cuisine options in 2014. Burma Love makes no attempt to hide its affiliation with Burma Superstar as seen by its website: