Does the Fair Labor Standards Act's antiretaliation provision protect complaints of violations that are made orally? It does the Supreme Court ruled in Kasten v. Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics, No 09-834 (March 22, 2011).
The Fair Labor Standards Act establishes federal wage and hour requirements as well as overtime compensation requirements. A protected complaint regarding a possible violation of the law, the Court ruled, must provide "fair notice" of its intended substance and meet the following criteria:
a complaint must be sufficiently clear and detailed for a reasonable employer to understand it, in light of both content and context, as an assertion of rights protected bythe statute and a call for their protection. This standard can be met, however, by oral complaints, as well as by written ones.
Justice Breyer wrote the opinion for the Court's 6-2 majority; Justices Scalia and Thomas dissented.
