Do the New Overtime Rules Affect You?

Effective December 1, 2016, federal overtime regulations will change and may affect how you are paying your employees.  These overtime updates will affect 4.2 million workers across the country.

The new rules will raise the salary overtime-eligibility threshold from $455/week to $913 ($47,476 per year).  This new threshold will increase every three years.  Salaried workers already entitled to overtime will get increased protection.

Employers have a choice of three actions they can take to employees who become eligible for overtime that weren’t before.

1. Pay time-and-a-half for overtime work.
2. Raise worker’s salaries above the new threshold.
3. Limit worker’s hours to 40 per week.

Let’s say you have an employee that earns $500 per week and works 50 hours a week.  Previously, you didn’t pay overtime, but beginning December 1, 2016, you will need to.  At $12.50 per hour, you would owe them the regular $500 plus 10 hours of overtime at $187.50.

Let’s say you have an employee earning $800 per week and they work 50 hours.  Previously, you didn’t pay overtime, but now you will need to consider it.  You could pay them overtime, which works out to a weekly pay of $1100.  Or you can choose to give them a raise to $913 per week – the new threshold – and continue to exempt them from overtime.  The latter is the lowest cost alternative.

In both cases above, it may be cheaper to hire an additional part-time worker to work the 10 extra hours per week.

You can find more about the new overtime law here:
https://www.dol.gov/featured/overtime/

And if you have any questions about your payroll, feel free to reach out anytime.