Judge Lee W. Tsao, Case 21NWCV00391 2023-03-22 Tentative Ruling

Judge: Lee W. Tsao, Case: 21NWCV00391, Date: 2023-03-22 Tentative Ruling

Case Number: 21NWCV00391 Hearing Date: March 22, 2023 Dept: SEC

FLORES v. SUNRISE FOOD SERVICE, INC.

CASE NO.: 21NWCV00391

HEARING: 3/22/23 @ 1:30 PM

TENTATIVE RULING

Defendant Sunrise Food Service, Inc.’s petition to consolidate arbitrations is DENIED.

Opposing Party to give NOTICE.

Defendant Sunrise Food Service, Inc. (“Sunrise”) moves to consolidate arbitrations pursuant to CCP § 1281.3.

“A party to an arbitration agreement may petition the court to consolidate separate arbitration proceedings, and the court may order consolidation of separate arbitration proceedings when: (1) Separate arbitration agreements or proceedings exist between the same parties; or one party is a party to a separate arbitration agreement or proceeding with a third party; and (2) The disputes arise from the same transactions or series of related transactions; and (3) There is common issue or issues of law or fact creating the possibility of conflicting rulings by more than one arbitrator or panel of arbitrators. If all of the applicable arbitration agreements name the same arbitrator, arbitration panel, or arbitration tribunal, the court, if it orders consolidation, shall order all matters to be heard before the arbitrator, panel, or tribunal agreed to by the parties. If the applicable arbitration agreements name separate arbitrators, panels, or tribunals, the court, if it orders consolidation, shall, in the absence of an agreed method of selection by all parties to the consolidated arbitration, appoint an arbitrator in accord with the procedures set forth in Section 1281.6.” (CCP § 1281.3.)

On or about June 17, 2022, Plaintiff Flores filed a Private Attorney General Act of 2004 (“PAGA”) against Defendant Sunrise. In the Complaint, Flores alleges that Sunrise violated certain statutory requirements, including, but not limited to, failure to pay minimum wages and overtime, failure to provide meal and rest breaks, failure to timely pay wages, failure to timely pay wages upon termination and failure to provide accurate wage statements.

On September 13, 2022, the Court granted Sunrise’s Petition to Compel Arbitration against Flores and compelled Flores to binding arbitration on his individual claims. Subsequently, Flores’s counsel filed four Demands for Arbitration on behalf of other Sunrise employees, Martinez, Perez, Torres and Cervantes.

The Arbitration Agreement expressly provides: "Except as otherwise provided in this Agreement, the Company and Employee mutually agree to resolve by arbitration any and all Disputes and claims described in Paragraph 2 below [Covered Claims] by final and binding arbitration pursuant to the federal Arbitration Act." (Arbitration Agreement ¶ 1.) Additionally, the Agreement provides that the "parties mutually agree to bring any and every Dispute in arbitration on an individual basis only, and not as a class and/or collective action." (Id. ¶ 9.)

Only Flores’s individual labor claims were ordered to arbitration. The representative PAGA claim was stayed. Therefore, Flores, Martinez, Perez, Torres and Cervantes’s claims are individual and distinct, and there is no possibility of conflicting rulings.

The motion is DENIED.