By Anna Skinner
With the Dept. of Labor overtime changes approaching Dec. 1, the Westfield Chamber of Commerce held an economic development breakfast Aug. 26 with Church, Church Hittle and Antrim to speak on overtime changes and what employers need to know.
CCHA Partners Brent Borg and Kevin Smith gave a presentation highlighting different options employers will have in December.
The change will bring the salary of those exempt from overtime from a minimum of $23,660 to $47,475. Employers must pay exempt employees that minimum or reclassify their jobs to hourly where they can either work a 40-hour work week or be paid overtime.
Borg said the new law came about mostly because of retail workers – those who work in beween 60 to 80 hours a week and receive a salary of $25,000 to $35,000.
The two options presented were to either heighten the employee’s salary to the new minimum, or put the employee on an hourly payroll.
“If you’re going to move people around, you need to consider not only the effect of that person but the effect of other employees by moving them around,” Smith said. “As an employer, you want to keep them happy. If someone is making a certain amount of money and expecting a certain amount of overtime, that might not go over so well, so you might be taking risks.”
“To reasonably control the costs associated with switching an employee to non-exempt, employers should consider implementing measures to control overtime, such as job sharing or additional hires,” Borg added. “Particularly, if you’re moving a situation of someone exempt and you can’t afford it, you need to think about controlling hours and controlling overtime. You need to think about the control issue and what the overtime impact is going to be.”
For more, visit www.dol.gov.
