Oregon Korean barbecue chain hit for child labor, overtime and tip theft

A 15-year-old on the schedule, overtime left unpaid and a manager taking part of the tip pool cost Kkoki Korean BBQ $96,985 and put the Oregon chain back under federal scrutiny.

The U.S. Department of Labor said on April 15 that the investigation found the Eugene-, Portland- and Salem-based chain let the teen work more than three hours on school days, past 9 p.m. during the summer window covered by the case, and more than 40 hours in a workweek. For 14- and 15-year-olds, federal child labor rules generally allow work only outside school hours, after 7 a.m. and before 7 p.m., with the evening cutoff extended to 9 p.m. from June 1 through Labor Day.

Investigators also said Kkoki failed to pay overtime correctly and let a manager unlawfully participate in the employee tip pool. Under federal wage law, covered workers generally must receive time and one-half for hours over 40 in a week, and managers and supervisors are barred from keeping employees’ tips or joining tip pools. For restaurant workers, that is not an abstract compliance issue. It affects the size of a paycheck, the fairness of a shift, and whether a teenager is being put on the floor or in the kitchen outside legal limits.

The agency said the case produced $58,569 in back wages for 32 workers and $38,416 in civil money penalties for repeated and willful violations. That kind of penalty structure matters because it signals more than a bookkeeping error. It tells operators that investigators saw enough to treat the problems as systemic, not isolated.

If managers wanted to avoid this outcome, the fix would have started in scheduling, not after payroll ran. A 15-year-old would have needed school-day shifts trimmed to the legal window and summer shifts cut off by 9 p.m. Overtime would have had to be calculated weekly, not by some longer pay-period threshold. Tip distribution would have needed a hard wall between hourly staff and anyone acting as a manager or supervisor.

The case also lands with extra force because federal investigators had already taken action against KKOKI Korean BBQ in 2022. That earlier case found the chain withheld tips, let managers take part of workers’ tips and paid overtime only after 86 hours per pay period instead of after 40 hours per week. Federal officials said that action recovered $169,728 for 118 workers, including back wages, liquidated damages and penalties.

In fiscal 2021 alone, the Wage and Hour Division opened 4,237 food service investigations and recovered $34.7 million in back wages for more than 29,000 employees nationwide. For restaurant operators, the message is plain: child labor rules, overtime rules and tip rules are enforced on the same floor where the shifts are run, the receipts are closed and the paycheck gets made.