No Collective-Action Mandamus

In In re Alliance Liftboats, LLC, the Fifth Circuit denied a petition for a writ of mandamus seeking review of a district court’s collective-action certification order in a Fair Labor Standards Act case. The petitioner argued that mandamus was its only available path to relief, because collective action is otherwise non-appealable, and that improper certification would cause irreparable harm.

As to the substantive ruling, the Court held that an employer can preserve its challenge and raise the issue on ordinary appeal from final judgment. As for the claimed harm from litigating as a collective action, the Court said that to obtain mandamus relief, “[t]here has to be a greater burden, some obstacle to relief beyond litigation costs that renders obtaining relief not just expensive but effectively unobtainable.” No. 26-30091, Mar. 11, 2026; cf. In re JP Morgan Chase, 916 F.3d 494 (5th Cir. 2019) (denying mandamus relief but staying the district court’s order about individual notice for thirty days to allow reconsideration).