Women who were part of a massive class action lawsuit against Wal-Mart will have until the end of October to file individual lawsuits against the company, a U.S. judge ruled.

Women who say the company denied them pay raises and promotions because of gender bias are regrouping after the U.S. Supreme Court dismantled a class of up to 1.5 million current and former Wal-Mart workers in June.

Attorneys for the women are expected to try to fashion smaller class actions as the litigation moves forward.

In an order issued on Friday, U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer in San Francisco gave women who were part of the large class, and who had received permission to sue from the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, until October 28 to file lawsuits.

Plaintiffs must first take up claims with the EEOC before being able to file a lawsuit in federal court. Other potential plaintiffs who never filed a charge with the EEOC against Wal-Mart have until next year to do that.

The court agreed with us that there needed to be a consistent, common date that applies to all claims of former class members, said plaintiff attorney Jocelyn Larkin.

This is a fair approach that is very similar to what we proposed, Wal-Mart attorney Theodore Boutrous Jr. said.

The case is Betty Dukes et al v Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, 01-cv-02252.

(Reporting by Dan Levine)

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