Melis Atalay

Melis focuses her practice on wage and hour matters. She partners with employers in all aspects of employment law, from aggressive litigation defense to tailored compliance advice to avoid the courtroom.  Melis counsels employers on a wide array of topics, including off-the-clock, meal periods and rest breaks, expense reimbursement, regular rate calculation, commission agreements, joint-employment, and misclassification claims.

Her recent successes include:

• Defeating a motion for class certification involving over 70,000 non-exempt employees on meal break, rest period, and off-the-clock claims
• Negotiating a complete dismissal for national retailer client in wage-and-hour class action without any client contribution
• As first appearance in joint-employment action involving national retailer client, obtaining an order dismissing without leave to amend
• Filing a successful opposition to a petition for Ninth Circuit review of an order denying class certification regarding off-the-clock claims
• Filing numerous of successful motions to dismiss class action claims for unpaid wages, meal and rest periods, FCRA, unfair competition law, and/or derivative penalties without leave to amend
• Negotiating a complete dismissal of international manufacturing client from class action before filing an answer and without any client contribution
• Obtaining numerous orders to stay class actions based on prior-filed claims for manufacturing, logistics, and retailer clients
• Defeating a plaintiff’s motion to certify for interlocutory appeal a federal court’s favorable order dismissing claim for violation of Labor Code section 204

Melis enjoys providing her clients practical advice. Examples of her counselling services include: conducting comprehensive wage-and-hour audits; training exempt and non-exempt workforces concerning wage-and-hour compliance; designing meal and rest period attestations processes; developing compliant policies; providing advice to bolster exemption statuses; and writing severance agreements and commission agreements.

Melis also knows how to successfully defend her clients in highly-contentious, single-plaintiff matters.  Highlights of recent victories include: successfully moving to dismiss her client from a discrimination and wrongful termination action based on a sovereign immunity defense; filing a successful motion for summary adjudication of age discrimination, disability discrimination, and intentional infliction of emotional distress claims; and negotiating a walk-away deal in a disability discrimination action with no client contribution.