In yesterday’s Advisor, we featured lawsuit avoidance tips from Attorney William J. Anthony. Today, we’ll cover more of his wage and hour tips, and we’ll take a look at a unique one-stop solution for meeting HR challenges.
Anthony made his remarks at a recent seminar sponsored by national law firm Jackson Lewis LLP, where he is a partner in the Hartford, Connecticut, office. He was joined in the presentation by Senior Associate David R. Golder.
No Good Deed Goes Unpunished
At one of Anthony’s client companies, all employees worked 9 to 6 and took an unpaid 1-hour lunch break. The employees approached the client and said, "Gee, we’d rather have two 15-minute breaks and a 1/2 hour lunch period." The employer said, "Sure, as long as everyone realizes that I’m not paying more than 8 hours a day." The new setup worked fine for years until the state Department of Labor (DOL) inspected.
DOL determined that the 15-minute breaks were compensable. "That’s a half hour a day for two years multiplied by the number of employees and double damages—quite a shock to the manager who just tried to respond to employee wishes," says Anthony.
Auto-Deductions for Lunch
Anthony talked to an HR VP who was raving about his company’s new electronic timekeeping system. "The best thing is, it automatically deducts 30 minutes for lunch."
"My heart skipped a beat," Anthony says.
"Yeah, we no longer have to worry about people forgetting to punch in or punch out, forgetting to record their time," the VP said.
"Call me,” Anthony said. "You are going to be a big client of ours."
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There are massive class actions going on around this issue, Anthony says. Auto-deduction is not by itself unlawful. What’s unlawful is not accurately recording employees’ time. Make sure that you have a system in place where, if employees don’t get an uninterrupted 30 minutes, they can get their supervisors to override the system and report accurate hours.
It’s best, says Anthony, to get the employee involved in approving any changes to time records. If it’s just the supervisor, that looks bad.
Complete and accurate records
You must keep complete and accurate time cards, Anthony says. If you record, "Monday, 6 hours, Tuesday 7.5 hours," that’s not adequate. Record time in and time out, including in and out times for lunch.
Why You Want Good Records
One client had drivers who hadn’t been paid overtime as required, and their attorneys were asking for payment for an additional 6 hours per week for each of 850 employees. Fortunately, the employer had time records, signed by the employees, indicating that there wasn’t that much overtime. The company will probably pay for just 1 extra hour per week. "Without the records, the 6 hours might have stood up," Anthony noted.
Wage and hour. Certainly a hassle but, really, just one of dozens of challenges on the HR desk. Others include COBRA changes, FMLA intermittent leave, ADA accommodation, and harassment, to name just a few.
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