For Labor Ready, the nation's largest temporary employer of construction workers, West Virginia construction laborer Larry Richards is a 'maid.'

That was one of 126 times Richards alone was misclassified - for workers' compensation purposes - by Labor Ready from March 1996-December 2000, a new report says. Labor Ready also called Richards a clerk 26 times and a 'miscellaneous repair and maintenance worker' 99 times.

That last category of workers includes such professions as piano tuners, clergy and taxidermists, the AFL-CIO Building and Construction Trades Department report notes.

But never, for workers' comp purposes, did Labor Ready tell West Virginia that Richards really was a construction laborer.

That's important. Given the hazards of construction, company workers' comp premiums for construction workers are higher than for other workers.

Richards is not alone: Labor Ready's misclassification is nationwide, the department's report says. It found one-third of all of Labor Ready's workers - including its temps - were construction workers. But Labor Ready reported only one-tenth of its workers were in construction.

Investigation requested
The report prompted Building Trades Department President Edward C. Sullivan to ask all state workers' comp regulators to open or expand investigations of Labor Ready - and to consider criminal prosecution of the company.

'We haven't taken this issue to the (U.S.) Labor Department because workers' comp is state-specific,' adds Building Trades Department researcher Will Collette, who tracks the Labor Ready mess. 'At some point, we anticipate federal prosecution.'

But not right now, he adds. If it wants to prosecute Labor Ready for breaking federal laws, the Labor Department must ask the Justice Department to do so, Collette notes. 'And Justice is pretty focused on post-9/11 anti-terrorist stuff,' he adds.

Workers' comp premiums for construction workers are 10 times those for 'miscellaneous repair' workers. And company records, provided to the Charleston Gazette and Mail, show a rate of 20 workers' comp claims per 100 Labor Ready workers, compared to eight per 100 in construction industry overall.

The report, citing company records, found Labor Ready denies sending clerical workers onto construction jobs. But in several states, nearly all of its workers were 'clerical,' it adds.

Several states fined Labor Ready for misreporting workers and others are investigating it--and not just for workers' comp misreporting. On April 29, for example, Oregon became the latest state to fine Labor Ready for underpaying its construction workers and breaking prevailing wage laws.

The report also says that due to the misclassifications, Labor Ready has underpaid both its insurers and state workers' comp funds. In several states where it has major projects, such as New York, it paid no workers' comp claims at all--despite injuries in those states.

Worker treatment challenged
Labor Ready has also lost court cases over the way it pays its temp construction workers. It pays them daily and forces them to cash checks at company check-cashing machines that charge high fees for each transaction.

And it claimed that because it paid the workers every day, it effectively hired and let them go every day, thus making them 'independent contractors,' not covered by labor law, as opposed to 'employees,' who are. The very conservative Fourth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals dismissed that argument as ridiculous. It called Labor Ready's temps 'employees' covered by labor law - and thus open to organizing.

Labor Ready dismissed the Building Trades report as 'the latest effort to distract the company' from employing workers. It denied misclassifying workers or underpaying workers' comp.

This article was written by Press Associates, Inc., news service. Used by permission.