Courts addressing FLSA misclassification claims brought by employees classified as salaried exempt workers must determine damages. In a new decision from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana, Judge Jane Triche Milazzo ruled that successful Plaintiffs in one such misclassification case are only entitled to “half-time” damages. Further, the Court
fair labor standards act
Fifth Circuit: Employer Has Right to Mandate Employee Compliance with Overtime Reporting Procedures And Is Not Liable When Employee Fails to Follow Procedures
Overtime claims based on alleged “off the clock” work often turn on the question of whether the employer has “suffered or permitted” the employee to work uncompensated hours in excess of forty in the workweek. The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit has affirmed a Mississippi district court’s finding that an employer…
Caretakers’ Own Homes Were “Private Homes,” Rendering Them Exempt Companions
Though the USDOL’s new rule regarding overtime-eligibility for home care workers is currently in force, pending appeal, litigation continues over the prior rule. A new appellate ruling addresses the scope of the term “private home” for purposes of the prior rule, clarifying that the former exemption applies to caregiver work in the private homes…
Ohio Federal Court Rules Home Care Agency Not Required To Pay Overtime To “Companions” During Temporary Vacatur Of New Federal Rules
Providing much needed guidance to industry employers still wrestling with fallout from the United States Department of Labor’s drastic reduction to the scope of the companionship exemption, District Court Judge Sandra S. Beckwith held this week that a home care agency properly relied on the temporary vacatur of the DOL’s new federal regulations in…
Ohio Federal Court Rejects Challenge to Application of Companionship Exemption to Home Health Aide
Last week, an Ohio, a federal judge held that a home health aide failed to demonstrate that she performed general housework unrelated to the care of her patients, and therefore qualified as a provider of companionship services under the Fair Labor Standards Act’s previous formulation of the “companion” exemption. As such, the home health…
When Will The DOL Issue Final Regulations Increasing The Salary Basis Threshold?
Since the United States Department of Labor announced its intention, in response to the President’s directive, to more than double the salary basis necessary to qualify for the “white collar” exemptions from overtime, the business community has swung into action. Employers and associations have both been lobbying for a more modest increase to the minimum…
Court Finds Employer Entitled to Flexibility Under FLSA In Determining Employee’s “Workweek”
Under the Fair Labor Standards Act, covered employers must pay non-exempt employees overtime wages for hours worked in excess of forty in a workweek. To comply, while employers must define the workweek, they retain the flexibility to do so as they see fit, as demonstrated by venerable Brooklyn-based federal Judge Jack Weinstein in a new…
Home Care Fallout: Increased Institutionalization?
Five days into the DOL’s enforcement of the new rule rendering most home health aides eligible for overtime under the FLSA, questions abound regarding how state Medicaid and Medicare-funded programs will comply with the rule within their current budgets. One new report cautions consumers of home health care and their advocates to be aware…
DOL Enforcement of Home Care Rule to Commence November 12, Subject to “Prosecutorial Discretion”
Chief Justice Roberts’ denial of the Home Care Association of America’s request for stay of issuance of mandate confirms that the new rule rendering many home health aides overtime-eligible is effective, pending appeal. In response to that denial, Wage-and-Hour Administrator David Weil issued a new policy statement confirming that the Department’s “non-enforcement period” for the…
Trauma Registrar Properly Classified As Exempt Administrative Employee Due To Exercise Of Discretion
Rejecting a claim that the position lacked “discretion and independent judgment,” an Indiana Federal Court recently found a trauma registrar for a Level III Trauma Center to be an exempt administrative employee. Brown v. Ind. Univ. Health Ball Mem’l Hosp., 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 141921 (S.D. Ind. Oct. 19, 2015).
In Brown,…