Young v. Physician Office Partners
| Decision Date | 25 March 2020 |
| Docket Number | CIVIL ACTION No. 18-2481-KHV |
| Parties | KIMBERLY YOUNG, Plaintiff, v. PHYSICIAN OFFICE PARTNERS, INC., Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — District of Kansas |
On September 7, 2018, Kimberly Young sued Physician Office Partners, Inc., alleging that based on her race, defendant paid her less, retaliated against her for making complaints of race discrimination and terminated her employment.1 Complaint For Damages (Doc. #1). Plaintiff sues under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000e et seq. ("Title VII"), and 28 U.S.C. § 1981 ("Section 1981"). Pretrial Order (Doc. #54) filed September 27, 2019. This matter is before the Court on Defendant's Motion For Summary Judgment (Doc. #56) filed October 1, 2019. For reasons stated below, the Court overrules defendant's motion.
Defendant is a healthcare services cycle management company. Plaintiff is an African-American woman with an associate degree in occupational studies from Vatterott College. At Vatterott, plaintiff studied medical billing and medical terminology. Later, she worked for twoyears in medical billing and coding for a medical provider.
In August of 2016, defendant established a Quality Assurance Department. That month, a staffing agency (KForce) assigned plaintiff to do medical data entry in defendant's Quality Assurance Department.
In October of 2016, defendant created the positions of Quality Analyst I and Quality Analyst II - both within the Quality Assurance Department. In November of 2016, defendant hired plaintiff to do data entry as a Quality Analyst I. Later that month, the Quality Assurance Department became the "the Quality Reporting Department," and the Quality Analyst I and Quality Analyst II positions became "Abstractor I" and "Abstractor II." Accordingly, plaintiff's job title changed from Quality Analyst I to Abstractor I.
Although the job descriptions listed identical minimum qualifications, Abstractor I and Abstractor II employees initially performed different duties. While Abstractor II employees reviewed medical documentation and abstracted data, Abstractor I employees primarily entered data. Defendant paid Abstractor II employees on a higher scale, and they had a higher earning potential than Abstractor I employees. The starting salaries for both Abstractor I and Abstractor II positions were based on a number of factors, including the applicant's salary as a temporary employee (if applicable), desired salary stated in their application, medical coding experience, ability to analyze medical records and educational background.
During plaintiff's employment, Abstractor I employees were predominantly African-American, while Abstractor II employees were predominantly Caucasian. Specifically, the Quality Reporting Department had seven Abstractor I employees (five African-American and two Caucasian) and ten Abstractor II employees (eight Caucasian, one Hispanic and one African-American). On February 2, 2017, defendant selected Tim Ferris and Jennifer Kraft - twoCaucasian Analysist II employees - for new "Team Lead" positions, leaving eight Abstractor II employees (six Caucasian, one Hispanic and one African-American). As of August of 2017, five of the employees within the Quality Reporting Department were African-American, all of whom were Abstractor I employees and all of whom earned $17 per hour. This rate was the same or higher than all other Abstractor I employees. By contrast, all of the Abstractor II employees were Caucasian with the exception of one Hispanic individual. The Abstractor II employees earned between $18.50 and $20 per hour.
During plaintiff's employment, Lauren Hidaka managed the Quality Reporting Department. In this role, she had the authority to discipline and fire subordinates, but she consulted with the Human Resources and Compliance department ("HR") before administering any discipline. Hidaka's boss was Deb Taylor - the Vice President of HR. Taylor oversaw Hidaka's department, and the two worked closely together.
Defendant was independently owned until 2012, when a company named Envision acquired it. After the purchase, defendant's executive management remained unchanged and it continued to operate separate from Envision. Accordingly, defendant maintained its own employment policies. Under these policies, all abstractors received weekly audits which detailed their performance - good and bad. The audits were designed to measure whether abstractors were meeting the accuracy goal of 96 per cent. The audits were not discipline, but were "discussions" and "purely educational." While defendant did have an objective performance goal - the 96 per cent accuracy rate - departmental managers like Hidaka decided whether and when to discipline an employee for failing to meet this goal. Departmental managers had the discretion to issue verbal or written warnings, and to place an employee on a Performance Improvement Plan ("PIP"). Defendant gave PIPs to help employees improve their performance. A PIP oftencontained specific target dates and was available to employees to reference as they attempted to improve their performance. Managers also had discretion to proceed directly to termination for serious misconduct such as threats of violence. At times, Hidaka would use an employee's annual performance review as an opportunity to issue discipline such as a written warning or place an employee on a PIP. Defendant maintained these policies until January 1, 2019, when it adopted Envision's corporate employment policies.
In the spring of 2017, the Quality Reporting Department increased production quotas for all employees, who were then expected to review 160 cases per day. Defendant still expected all employees to enter data and/or abstract data at an accuracy rate of 96 per cent. Ferris and Kraft tracked the progress of all abstractors, including their mistakes, and submitted reports to Hidaka. In more than one report, Ferris noted that plaintiff was confused, moved slowly, mistyped information and entered data at an accuracy rate of less than 96 per cent. On October 10, 2017, Hidaka emailed Ferris and Kraft, questioning why plaintiff's productivity was consistently under 100 cases per day. In that email, Hidaka raised similar concerns with respect to another abstractor (Jaclyn Sherrer). In response, Ferris stated that it took a day or two for plaintiff to "switch gears" when she moved from one account to another, and she got confused and "stuck" when she encountered different kind of forms.
On July 11, 2017, plaintiff emailed Hidaka to inquire whether defendant would increase the pay of Abstractor I employees to match that of Abstractor II employees. On July 13, 2017, Hidaka forwarded plaintiff's email to Taylor. Hidaka told Taylor that the Abstractor I employees and Abstractor II employees were essentially doing the same jobs. Specifically, although Abstractor I employees were initially limited to data entry, the entire Quality ReportingDepartment was now reviewing medical documentation and abstracting data. Accordingly, each employee in the Quality Reporting Department was effectively an Abstractor II. In response, Taylor asked Hidaka whether everyone would remain an Abstractor II if physician practice management ("PPM") providers made requests on different forms.2 Hidaka responded that even if PPM providers changed their forms, "maybe one person" would be doing data entry as an Abstractor I employee. Hidaka specified that plaintiff would not be going back to an Abstractor I position.
In response to plaintiff's inquiry, defendant did not increase her compensation or that of other Abstractor I employees. Taylor does not recall looking into the pay disparity between Abstractor I and Abstractor II employees, and she does not recall following up with Hidaka about it. Moreover, Taylor did not have any discussions with plaintiff about her concerns regarding the disparity.
On October 16, 2017, the team lead - Ferris - had an angry outburst in front of plaintiff at work. Plaintiff claims that during their meeting, Ferris lost his cool, shouted at her and pounded his hand on the table. Plaintiff reported to Hidaka that she had feared for her life because she thought that Ferris was going to do something to her. In that regard, plaintiff cited the growing threat of gun violence in the workplace. On October 17, 2017, plaintiff submitted a written summary of the confrontation to Taylor and Lynn Sati, the HR manager. Over several days, Taylor and Sati interviewed plaintiff, Ferris, Hidaka and Kraft. HR then assigned plaintiff to a different Team Lead - Kraft.
Around September, October or November of 2017, plaintiff made an internal complaint about racial discrimination to her management team or HR.3 On November 2, 2017, plaintiff filed a Charge of Discrimination with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ("EEOC"). On November 8, 2017, defendant received notice of plaintiff's EEOC Charge. Pursuant to defendant's internal policies, employees were supposed to bring complaints of discrimination to HR, which was required to investigate the concerns and document its investigation. While conducting an investigation, defendant's policies directed HR to gather witness statements and interview the complaining party. In response to plaintiff's charge, HR determined that plaintiff's allegations were unfounded, and it did not interview plaintiff or any other employees in the Quality Reporting Department.
On November 6, 2017, plaintiff refused to sign her audits, complained that defendant had not adequately trained her and accused her management team of fabricating her audit results. Later that day, Kraft sent plaintiff a detailed instructional email which contained screen shots of training materials that defendant had provided plaintiff at the beginning of her employment....
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