From the Lowell Sun April 21, 2009
By Alexandra Mayer-Hohdahl and Robert Mills, Sun Staff
On April 10, Attorney General Martha Coakley announced that Excel Home Care Inc., of Tewksbury, had been fined $14,000 and ordered to pay more than $7,800 in restitution to 10 employees.
Coakley said the company also failed to provide employees with proper pay stubs.
The Tewksbury-based agency, which has offered in-home medical, psychological, social and rehabilitative services to disabled individuals throughout Greater Lowell since 1997, employs a total of about 130 nurses and home aides.
It first made headlines in November, after three employees picketed in front of the Village Green commercial development, where Excel Home Care leases a suite. They alleged that owner Diane Porter had not been paying them regularly since August.
Coakley's office said it received multiple complaints from former and current employees starting in July. Investigators with the Fair Labor Division found that Excel Home Care owed 15 employees more than $14,300 in wages for hours worked from May 2007 to February 2009.
At that time, Porter paid $6,540 in restitution to five of the employees, but failed to compensate the others for their work, according to the statement.
Yesterday afternoon, Porter said she had put the situation behind her.
"It's all been taken care of," she said. "This is old news. And out of 130 employees, there were only a handful with problems."
But later, when The Sun contacted an employee for his reaction to the news, Dan Souza, 26, of Lowell, said Excel currently owes him more than $1,000 in pay.
A co-worker, Ken Wilk, 27, also of Lowell, said the same, adding that he recently got an eviction notice for his downtown Lowell apartment because he hadn't paid rent since he hadn't been paid.
Both men said they have contacted Coakley's office and are in the process of filling out paperwork that prosecutors sent them. The complaints from Souza and Wilk are apparently new and not among the complaints that led to Excel being fined.
Coakley's spokeswoman, Emily LaGrassa, said she was not aware of any new allegations last night, but encouraged anyone who has not been paid to call Coakley's Fair Labor Intake line at (617) 727-3465.
Porter did not return a telephone message at her home last night.
Wilk, a college graduate who is certified as a tutor and educator, said he went to work for Excel a little over two months ago.
At first he was paid on time, but as of yesterday, he said it had been more than three weeks since he had been paid.
Employees are supposed to be paid biweekly, according to both Souza and Wilk.
Without a paycheck, Wilk fell behind on rent, and a constable served him an eviction notice last week, though he said he has since spoken to his landlord and worked out a deal to stave off eviction.
"I haven't slept in, like, two weeks," he said. "I've been dodging everyone. The stress level is outrageous."
Wilk said he stopped going to work about a week ago because he hadn't been paid. Souza said he stopped going about two weeks ago.
"I have refused to go back to work until I have gotten all my pay," Wilk said. "That's where I've left it at this point."
Souza said he started work at Excel about a month and a half ago and has received only one paycheck, for $300, in that entire time. He says he is still owed several weeks pay.
"I worked for over a month without getting paid before I had enough," Souza said. "I contacted Coakley's office and got a complaint form in the mail. They said it would take like five weeks for it to go through."
Porter, 63, has lived in Tewksbury for more than four decades. She is well known around town, primarily for her work with Youth Enhancement Services, a nonprofit agency that provides a free after-school program.
