FLSA

New OT rule to be finalized in April

12/11/2023

If enacted, the rule would raise the white-collar overtime salary threshold to $55,068 per year, up from the current level of $35,568. An April 1 date for publishing the final rule would push back implementation until June at the earliest.

Wage & hour: Heed DOL’s $12 million warning to the hospitality industry

12/11/2023

The Department of Labor has been targeting restaurants and other hospitality-industry employers for aggressive enforcement of the Fair Labor Standards Act. It has issued fines and penalties and ordered restaurants to shut down until they pay up. That’s a powerful incentive for employers to settle lawsuits.

Lock her up! Defy DOL investigators, go to jail

12/04/2023

A federal court has ordered the owner of a Michigan senior home-care services company to go to prison if she continues to ignore a March 2023 order to provide U.S. Department of Labor investigators with time and pay records.

Warn managers against sending after-hours texts and emails to nonexempt subordinates

11/21/2023

Chances are, almost all your employees have mobile devices that let them send and receive texts and emails at any time. Advise managers of hourly employees not to send electronic messages to them outside working hours. That counts as work for which they must be paid under the Fair Labor Standards Act.

Tick tock, watch work off the clock

11/21/2023

Would you know compensable working time if you saw it? If you pay for noncompensable working time anyway, you can put conditions on your payment. Two cases illustrate.

You can’t dodge Title VII by misclassifying employees as independent contractors

10/25/2023

One benefit of engaging independent contractors to perform work is that contractors don’t count as employees for purposes of complying with laws such as Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. But, just calling someone an independent contractor doesn’t necessarily mean she is one. She might really be an employee.

Negligent employer liable for 2 years of back pay, not 3

10/25/2023

The Fair Labor Standards Act has two measures of liability: Pay two years of back pay if your failure to pay minimum wages or overtime wasn’t willful, or three years if it was. A mistaken failure to pay overtime due to negligence isn’t the same thing as willfully failing to pay employees, so an employer’s liability for back pay was limited to two years, a federal appeals court explained.

Legal arguments take shape as business groups oppose new overtime rule

09/25/2023

The Department of Labor’s proposed rule to raise the white-collar overtime salary threshold to $55,068—up from the current $35,568—will almost certainly face legal challenges in coming months. Business advocacy groups and some conservative politicians have vowed to sue to prevent the rule from taking effect.

What you should do now to prepare for the new overtime rule

09/18/2023

Now that the Department of Labor’s new proposed rule raising the white-collar overtime salary threshold has been published in the Federal Register, the clock has started ticking for employers to prepare for its eventual enactment.

As states relax child-labor laws, beware! Feds could still sue

09/15/2023

In an economy defined by labor in short supply, many employers may be tempted to hire more underage workers in order to remain fully staffed. That can be legally risky! Those employers may face scrutiny from the U.S. Department of Labor—and they could trigger backlash (and additional liability) if young workers are injured or harassed at work.