Google has agreed to pay $11 million to end a class-action lawsuit involving 227 people accusing the company of systemically discriminating against job applicants who were over the age of 40. Under the final settlement agreement, presented to a federal judge July 19, plaintiffs will collect an estimated $35,000 each.
Under the settlement, parent company Alphabet Inc. must also train employees and managers about age bias, create a committee on age diversity in recruiting and make sure complaints are adequately investigated.
The initial plaintiff was a software engineer who said Google interviewed her four times, from 2007-2014, beginning when she was 47. She was never hired, according to Forbes. She accused the company of hiring younger workers based on cultural fit.
Google has said she and the other plaintiffs did not demonstrate the required technical attitude, denied it intentionally discriminated against them because of their age and said that it has strong policies against discrimination, Bloomberg News reported.