The owners of the Simco's stands in Mattapan and Roslindale acknowledged they paid 20 workers below even the federal minimum wage and refused to pay overtime, in a proposed settlement of a US Department of Labor complaint filed in US District Court in Boston on Thursday.

If a judge agrees to the proposed agreement, owners Denise and Evangelos Fotopoulos will give the government $195,680.72, to be split among 20 workers as back payments and damages. They also agreed to pay a fine of $14,980.

In a separate document filed with the agreement, the US Labor Department says the two not only "willfully failed" to pay the workers at least $7.25 an hour - the federal minimum wage - they made some employees work more than 40 hours a week without paying them time and a half for overtime, between September, 2019 and September, 2021. The government also says the two failed to keep "accurate employment-related records under the Fair Labor Standards Act."

In addition to agreeing to compensate the workers, the owners also agreed to obey federal wage laws from now on at the stands on Blue Hill Avenue in Mattapan and American Legion Highway in Roslindale.