Wage and Hour Defense Blog

On May 25, 2021, both houses of the Illinois General Assembly approved an amendment to the State’s Wage Payment and Collection Act (“the Act”).  The change would require employers who violate the Act to pay damages of 5% of the amount of any underpayment of wages, compensation, or wage supplements for each month following the date of payment during which the amount(s) owed remain unpaid.  This represents a 150% increase to the penalty, as the statutory rate before this amendment was 2%.  The measure will take effect immediately upon signature by Governor J.B. Pritzker.

The Act

For decades, the practice of motor carriers arranging for freight to be transported by independent owner-operators—i.e., independent contractors who drive their own trucks—has been ubiquitous. However, this practice is now under threat in California because of a recent court decision.

On April 28, 2021, in California Trucking Ass’n v. Bonta, No. 20-55106 (9th Cir. 2021) (“CTA v. Bonta”), the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit addressed whether the broad preemption language of the Federal Aviation Administration Authorization Act of 1994 ...

As we previously discussed, in early January 2021, the U.S. Department of Labor issued a Final Rule regarding independent contractor status under the Fair Labor Standards Act.  On May 5, 2021, in line with the policy goals of the new administration, the Department issued a Final Rule withdrawing the January Final Rule.  The withdrawal went into effect on May 6, 2021, upon the publication in the Federal Register (86 FR 24303).  The January independent contractor rule was originally to go into effect in March, before the Department issued a notice of proposed rulemaking proposing to ...

With the United States in the midst of dealing with the coronavirus pandemic, there has been focused attention on the rollout of vaccines approved for emergency use by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, and the actual number of individuals being vaccinated. Presently, 250 million COVID-19 vaccine shots have been administered and individuals 16 years of age and older are eligible to receive the vaccine.  Now, in an effort to get more people vaccinated, employers are being encouraged to provide paid time off for employees who have not yet been vaccinated against the virus.

Federal ...

For more than 80 years, federal law has provided a general right to premium pay for working overtime hours, originally just for covered employees, then later for employees of covered enterprises.  The laws of more than 30 states contain a comparable requirement, though in some instances differing in the particulars.

This presumptive right to the overtime premium is, of course, subject to the familiar exemption construct whereby individuals whose employment satisfies one or more of the dozens of exempted categories fall outside the premium pay requirement.  Many of the most ...

Years ago, Epstein Becker Green (“EBG”) created its free wage-hour app to put federal, state, and local wage-laws at employers’ fingertips.

The app provides important information about overtime exemptions, minimum wages, overtime, meal periods, rest periods, on-call time, travel time, and tips.

As the laws have changed, so, too, has EBG’s free wage-hour app, which is updated to reflect new developments.

No fewer than 46 states (or the localities within them) had changes to their overtime, minimum wage, or child labor laws effective January 1, 2021 – and EBG’s ...

I had planned to focus this month’s installment of “Time Is Money” on the practice of rounding timeclock entries, addressing the history behind the practice as well as factors that make rounding today a riskier proposition than it used to be.  Then, while reviewing our previous writings on the subject, I came across my colleague Mike Kun’s treatment of the topic in our July 2019 installment, where he already said pretty much everything I had to say.

Back at the drawing board, it occurred to me that rounding is part of a broader challenge that businesses face: how best to record ...

We have previously discussed on this page how rounding practices can be problematic.  Now, in Donohue v. AMN Services, LLC, the California Supreme Court has provided yet another reason for employers in California to review their time rounding practices, as well as their meal period practices.

As we previously discussed, more than eight years ago in Brinker Restaurant Corp. v. Superior Court, the California Supreme Court clarified many of the general requirements for meal and rest periods under California law.  Relevant to the decision in Donohue, the Court held that employees must be ...

As featured in #WorkforceWednesday:  This week on our special podcast series, Employers and the New Administration, we look at how the Biden administration’s approach to wage and hour issues will impact employers. Special podcast episodes air every other #WorkforceWednesday.

The Wage and Hour Division of the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) has already adopted the Biden administration’s commitment to enforcement, its movement against arbitration agreements, and a fresh view on worker classification. What other wage and hour developments can employers expect under ...

A sometimes-overlooked requirement for classifying an employee as exempt from overtime is that, with limited exceptions, the employee must be paid on a “salary basis.” [1] Indeed, when employers fail to pay their exempt employees on a salary basis, they may be subject to lawsuits alleging exempt misclassification. As such, properly paying employees on a salary basis is critical to classifying employees as exempt.

The General Rule

Among other requirements, in order for an employer to classify an employee as exempt from overtime, the employee generally must be paid on a ...