BREAKING-ish, sorta, not really. Yeah, you knew this was coming. The DOL officially announces overtime changes.

Before all the Facebook creepiness, pukey-poopy emojis, and gushing over my awesome law firm, I foreshadowed some changes from the U.S. Department of Labor to the Fair Labor Standards Act overtime rules.

Yesterday, the DOL put a ring on it and made it official.

Here’s where I quote liberally from the DOL’s press release:

Under currently enforced law, employees with a salary below $455 per week ($23,660 annually) must be paid overtime if they work more than 40 hours per week. Workers making at least this salary level may be eligible for overtime based on their job duties. This salary level was set in 2004.

This new proposal would update the salary threshold using current wage data, projected to January 1, 2020. The result would boost the standard salary level from $455 to $679 per week (equivalent to $35,308 per year).

The Department is also asking for public comment on the NPRM’s language for periodic review to update the salary threshold. An update would continue to require notice-and-comment rulemaking.

But, wait, there’s more (from the actual proposed rule):

In this rulemaking, the Department proposes to … allow the inclusion of certain nondiscretionary bonuses and incentive payments to count towards up to 10 percent of the standard salary level. The Department also proposes to update the total annual compensation requirement for the “highly compensated employee” test, and to revise the special salary levels for employees in the motion picture industry and certain U.S. territories. Finally, this proposal discusses the Department’s intention to propose updates to the earnings thresholds every four years. This would provide clarity and help workers and employers by having a regular and orderly process for future changes.

Will this proposed rule become an actual rule? Bloomberg Law reports here that lawsuits to block the proposal are likely.

In the meantime, I’m curious about how your business may respond…

• Did you adjust employee pay back in 2016 in anticipation of the last proposed overtime rules, and keep those changes in place?
• Are you taking a wait-and-see approach?
• Will you convert salaried employees making less than $35, 308 per year to hourly? Give them raises? Limit their overtime?

Email me and let me know.

Have a wonderful weekend!!!