A Kentucky distribution center has been slapped with a $30,000 fine after the U.S. Labor Department found it illegally employed two children, one of whom operated a forklift.
Win.It America Inc.’s warehouse in Hebron, about 20 miles west of Cincinnati, was found to have employed an 11-year-old and a 13-year-old at its distribution center “for months,” the Labor Department said Friday in a news release.
The Labor Department’s Wage and Hour Division discovered the children in August.
One employed child operated a forklift, which is considered hazardous for workers under 18, and another child picked up orders in the warehouse, which is prohibited for workers under 16, the department said.
The children were also working "more hours than legally allowed and violated federal regulations that forbid employing workers under 14 years of age in non-agricultural occupations," the release said.
The Labor Department obtained a federal consent judgment on Sept. 8 that requires the operator of the Hebron warehouse to stop employing children and warns it against violating federal child labor laws in the future.
The court also ordered Win.IT America to pay $30,276 in civil penalties and to hire a third-party consultant to provide “semi-annual compliance training for all management personnel for a period of three years,” the release said.
Win.IT America, which was founded in 2013, is the U.S. branch of WinIT Information Technology Co., a Shanghai-based integrated supply chain company with over 700 employees in the U.S., Australia, Germany and Britain, officials said.
Win.IT America could not be immediately reached for comment.
The penalty comes amid a crackdown of child labor violations in the U.S., which the Wage and Hour Division’s regional administrator in Atlanta, Juan Coria, said are experiencing an "alarming increase."
“Employers are responsible for taking all appropriate actions to verify that they are not illegally employing children. When they fail to meet these obligations, we will act swiftly to hold them accountable and protect our nation’s youth,” Coria said.
In fiscal year 2022, the Labor Department found child labor violations involving nearly 4,000 children nationwide, an increase of more than 60% over the past five years.