Two staffing companies misclassified hundreds of workers, resulting in them being paid less than minimum wage and causing them to miss out on overtime and sick pay, a new audit from Denver Labor revealed Monday.

The two companies, Instawork and Gigpro, are temporary staffing agencies that placed workers such as bartenders, servers, dishwashers, general laborers and cleaners in positions in Denver’s hospitality and warehousing industries, according to the report.

Denver Labor, a division of the Denver Auditor’s Office, found the misclassifications resulted in more than 1,200 minimum wage violations, 700 overtime violations and 13,500 paid sick leave violations. The companies will have to pay almost $280,000 in restitution to the workers and over $800,000 in fines.

“Instawork is coordinating with the City of Denver to address an incomplete and non-final administrative determination issued by Denver Labor,” Kira Caban, Head of Strategic Communications for Instawork, told The Denver Gazette in an e-mailed statement on Monday. “While the company does not comment on active investigations, Instawork prioritizes compliance with applicable regulations and is committed to ensuring every person who uses our platform to find local work receives full and proper worker protections including payment at hourly rates that meet or exceed the minimum wage.”

The audit released Monday found Instawork misclassified about 3,000 workers as independent contractors and Gigpro misclassified about 90 workers. The auditor said the workers should have been classified as employees because, according to Colorado law, they worked for the staffing agencies’ benefit, did what was considered to be the “primary work” of the companies and had to follow detailed rules and policies for conduct that the agencies put in place.

“The pandemic showed us how crucial paid sick leave is for workplace safety,” Denver Auditor Timothy O’Brien said in a news release announcing the fines. “But all over Denver, thousands of people who make and serve food can’t take time off when they’re sick — putting both workers and customers at risk.”

O’Brien said in the modern gig economy, issues like this are common and employees are not able to take their cases to court and can’t join class action lawsuits due to the terms of their employment. So, it’s crucial for agencies like Denver Labor to step in and enforce the laws.

“Workers’ rights violations hurt all of us, especially when they’re so widespread,” O’Brien said in a news release. “Our decisions today ensure we’re following through on the intent of the law to protect families and communities from the harms of wage theft.”

The Denver auditor said undocumented workers, migrants, people of color and women are the groups that are most vulnerable to wage theft, and Denver Labor works to protect these workers from being exploited.

“Thousands of Denver employers work hard to follow the law and pay their employees what they earned,” O’Brien said in a news release. “They shouldn’t be undercut by competitors who save money by denying their employees basic rights. My office will always work to protect good faith employers.”

Gigpro did not immediately respond to The Denver Gazette’s attempt to reach the company via an online contact form.