Google is involved in another equal pay lawsuit.

This time, Cloud Engineering Director, Ulku Rowe, has sued the giant tech company claiming gender-based discrimination in violation of the U.S. Equal Pay Act and the New York City Human Rights Law. “Google violated the Equal Pay Act by paying Rowe less than her male counterparts for substantially equivalent work that required substantially equal skill, effort, and responsibility, and was performed under similar working conditions” court documents state.

Rowe, who previously held senior-level positions at JPMorgan Chase, America Merrill Lynch, and UBS, alleges that Google discriminated against her by hiring her for a lower-level position than her experience qualified her for and paying her “hundreds of thousands of dollars” less than her male counterparts with equal experience. The lawsuit also states Rowe was denied additional earned compensation and a promotion for which she was the most qualified candidate. Google instead promoted an under-qualified male peer while the VP “ignored her emails and excluded her from the development of the Financial Services vertical,” court documents state. The VP further “excluded her from staff meetings, email distribution lists, team off-sites, and one-on-one meetings” despite frequent meeting requests from Rowe.

In April 2019, Google allegedly retaliated to Rowe’s complaints about gender-discrimination by changing her role and “providing her with three undesirable options,” the lawsuit states. “All three positions are reasonably perceived as demotions as they are less prestigious and have less responsibility, less opportunity for upward advancement and less compensation potential.”

You can read the full legal complaint by clicking here.

This isn’t Google’s first time in the spotlight with sex-discrimination and equal pay violations. The tech giant is increasingly becoming known for its mistreatment of women and employees who speak up against misconduct. Let’s not forget:

● The class-action lawsuit from 8,000+ female employees who argued that Google regularly pays women less than it does men.

● The 20,000 Google employees who staged a global walkout in protest of the severance packages to male executives accused of sexual misconduct.

● Alphabet’s top lawyer being represented in a blog post by a former mistress as a serial womanizer who notoriously ignored company rules against dating subordinates.

● Alphabet voting down a proposal to develop the company’s sexual harassment policies and the global median gender pay gap.

This Silicon Valley giant is just one of several examples of companies within the tech industry that are being challenged for their failure to address pay discrimination and the gender pay gap within their organizations.