Madison small claims court denies $96 wage claim over unrecorded café closing shift

The small claims court in Madison denied Elena Brooks’s request for $96 in unpaid wages from Copper Finch Café LLC, finding insufficient evidence that she worked the six-hour closing shift she claimed. Judgment was entered for the café, with no wages awarded.

The dispute turned on the gap between being scheduled to work and proving the work was done. Brooks said she worked September 12 from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. despite a clock problem. The café pointed to a blank time entry and its owner’s recollection that Brooks took her bag and said she was leaving.

The court found that neither principal document settled attendance. The posted schedule established a planned shift and a $16 hourly rate, not that Brooks worked all six hours. The payroll report showed no recorded time or payment for September 12, but did not explain the blank entry.

Brooks referred to same-day messages about the clock problem, but the messages were not produced. Their contents, timing and reliability therefore could not be independently assessed. She also acknowledged having no further independent record or witness establishing the full shift.

The owner’s account had limits too. Relayed through a client statement rather than admitted witness testimony, it described Brooks taking her bag and saying she was leaving. But the owner left before closing, could not recall the relevant times and could not say Brooks left for good.

Those uncertainties did not remove Brooks’s burden to prove the hours underlying her request. Six hours at $16 plainly equalled $96; the missing element was sufficient proof that those hours were earned. The court also declined to find that Brooks breached a timekeeping protocol, because the café produced no separate policy document or other proof of its terms.

Brooks argued that the schedule, her account of working through a clock problem and the absence of payment supported the award. She stressed that the owner’s incomplete observations could not establish that she had left before working. She sought wages only, without penalties.

The café argued that it had paid every recorded hour and that no time record or witness established work throughout the disputed shift. It also said employees were expected to write down hours when the clock system malfunctioned, and sought denial of the claim without a countersuit.

The payroll report showed payment for Brooks’s other recorded shifts at the same $16 rate. September 12 stood apart because its entry was blank, leaving the parties to dispute whether that reflected an absence or unrecorded work.

The judgment resolves only the claim and evidence presented. It does not establish that Brooks was absent or that her account was false. Its central distinction is narrower: proof that a shift was planned and unpaid did not sufficiently establish the hours worked.