Opinion
C21-0359 TSZ
10-10-2023
AMICHAI OHRING, individually and on behalf of others similarly situated, Plaintiff, v. UNISEA, INC., Defendant.
MINUTE ORDER
The following Minute Order is made by direction of the Court, the Honorable Thomas S. Zilly, United States District Judge:
(1) In connection with their proposed collective and class action settlement, the parties have presented the following plan for serving notice on defendant UniSea, Inc.'s 1,524 former employees: (a) notices will be sent via U.S. mail to the 893 known physical addresses for such individuals; (b) notices will also be sent to 487 email addresses; and (c) if no physical address or email address is available, then notice will be sent via text message. See JSR at 6 (docket no. 65) The parties have indicated that they have access to 252 cell phone numbers and 322 home phone numbers; they have no current contact information for 10 former employees. Id. The Court DIRECTS the parties to file a Joint Status Report as soon as possible, but no later than October 27, 2023, addressing the following questions:
(a) How does the contact information for former employees overlap? In other words, for the 631 individuals (over 41% of the former employees) whose physical address is unknown, how many might receive notice via email, and of those for whom no physical or email address is available, how many have cell phone numbers on file?
(b) For how many, if any, of the former employees do the parties have only a home phone number, and for those individuals, how do the parties propose to provide notice?
(c) What is the specific content that the parties intend to include in any text messages? Do the parties propose to send the entire 9-page notice via text, to imbed within a text some kind of file containing the notice, to provide a link to the Settlement Administrator's website (where the full notice may be viewed and/or downloaded), or to use some other method to convey the necessary information?
(d) How will the form of device (basic feature phone, smartphone, etc.), the type of cellular service plan, and/or the quality of cellular coverage affect the recipients' abilities to view the text messages described in Paragraph 1(c)?
(2) Plaintiff Amichai Ohring's unopposed motion for preliminary approval of settlement, docket no. 52, is RENOTED to October 27, 2023.
(3) The Clerk is directed to send a copy of this Minute Order to all counsel of record.