New class certification decision: Walsh v. IKON Office Solutions, Inc.

Last week, the Court of Appeal (First Appellate District, Division Five) issued a partial publication order in Walsh v. IKON Office Solutions, Inc., ___ Cal.App.4th ___ (Mar. 1, 2007), a misclassification case. In the published portion of the opinion, the Court of Appeal affirmed an order granting the defendant's motion to decertify one of several subclasses. There is nothing particularly noteworthy about the decision; it does, however, provide more proof that after Sav-On, trial court orders either granting or denying class certification are unlikely to be touched on appeal.

(My post on the appellate procedure aspects of this decision can be found at my new blog, The Appellate Practitioner.)

Comments

[TommyK]

Isn't its take on the "intentional misclassification" theory interesting? It seems to say that even if the employer intentionally made everyone exempt without doing any analysis of whether they actually were exempt, that does not make the case suitable for class treatment if, in fact, a goodly portion of the putative class qualifies for the exemption based on their actual job duties. That rule is not the only plausible interpretation of Sav-On.