Legal problems
In October 2008, a Chili's Australia franchise was prosecuted and fined A$300,000 (equivalent to $416,240 in 2022) by the NSW Office of Industrial Relations for underpaying staff, pressuring employees to sign an Australian workplace agreement, and failing to pay A$45,000 (equivalent to $62,436 in 2022) in owed wages by a deadline set by the Office of Industrial Relations. In the same year, Chili's announced the permanent closure of all its Australian locations due to poor sales, unprofitability, and non-compliance with the Fair Work Act 2009.
In July 2024, American rap rock group the Beastie Boys filed a lawsuit against Chili's parent company Brinker International for copyright infringement, claiming that the group's 1994 song "Sabotage" has been illegally used to promote Chili's in advertisements on social media starting around November 2022.
In March 2026, a Chilli’s in Rosemont Illinois was sued for firing an assistant manager for their transgender identity. The plaintiff proclaimed that this is a violation of Illinois state law, as transgender people are defined as a protected class.
Controversies
2008: On June 5, a woman from Washington named Anne Paskett filed a class-action suit against Brinker International. Paskett and the rest of the plaintiffs claimed that the restaurant chain's so-called healthier offerings, like the Chili's "Guiltless Black Bean Burger" have nutritional values much different than the ones listed on the menu. Independent laboratory tests were conducted, discovering that the fat content of the items are sometimes double, or even triple, the amount shown on these menus.
2009: Brinker International fired a Chili's employee for the claim of sexual harassment, only to employ her again after the public outrage. They claimed that her termination was a computer error.
2018: Brinker International disclosed that its data network had been breached between March and April 2018, exposing the personally identifiable information of its customers. Subsequently, several customers of Chili's filed suit against the company, alleging that its failure to comply with industry standards for information security and implement adequate data security measures to protect its data networks from the potential danger of a data breach had caused them to incur fraudulent charges on their payment cards.
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2019: Chili's Restaurant was fined after an employee fell into a vat of scalding water.
2020: Brinker International and its Chili's subsidiary paid US$150,000 to settle sexual harassment allegations from five female employees.
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