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Suing for Overtime?
An unidentified submitter asks: "There is a federal law that requires all non programmer-type jobs be compensated for overtime. Last year, over the course of a year, I have worked 500 hours of overtime without comp time, bonus, or paid overtime. I have since left the company, and currently I am attempting to sue the company for lost wages. Has anyone ever been in a similar situation, and do they have any advice/tips? Also is anyone aware of good computer/IT labor attorneys?"
"programmer-type"?
What would that meen. Do Network Administrators fall in that catigory? How about website developers? Website designers? I'm wondering, how is it defined, and where is the line drawn?
I would start by making sure I had documentation of all of the hours I had worked and was suing for. I'm not sure how you would prove it otherwise.
Also, if you are working in an exempt position, you're probably screwed since bonuses & comp time aren't typically legally required by the company. Good luck though.
I think you will soon find that your emloyer considers that they factored in 'compensation' into your original package. At least that's what they "normally" do in Australia.
Perhaps the courts aren't your best recourse in this climate.
/* affect != effect */ void affect(int *thing,int effect) { *thing += effect; }
If you were a non-programmer-type (?!), then maybe you'd have a snowball's chance in hell of getting some sort of compensation.
If you were a programmer-type (?!), then you get the special privilege of a law designed to screw you specifically.
intel is having a few problems with its hire fire stratergy. The ex employees are taking a class action against the company over the "UNPAID OVERTIME" (Sorry but the website goes a little ott on the capitals)
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intel is having a few problems with its hire fire stratergy. The ex employees are taking a class action against the company over the "UNPAID OVERTIME" (Sorry but the website goes a little ott on the capitals)
Mouse powered Chips, Open source Processors and Lego
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In my field, in CA if you make $78k or more you are considered to be in a "management" position, and are not eligible for overtime. I believe the requirement is that a skilled field in a "management" level.
There are two classifications of overtime-- there are "exempt" and "non-exempt" employees.
Before you try and sue someone, check your time cards! If you didn't indicate on the time card that you worked overtime (and signed it), then you have lied... good luck getting any money! If the time is documented, but not paid, you have a chance.
... altough some could argue repeated.
Are Coders Exempt From California's Overtime Laws?
Welcome to the new slavery. If you are an IT worker in this economy, chances are your employer is using it to abuse you. You're not going anywhere, right? So I guess you wouldn't mind working 14 hours a day for the forseeable future.
Yes, I am an agent of Satan, but my duties are largely ceremonial.
Hrm. I've been putting in some rather excessive hours as a sysadmin, especially lately in moving systems into a new data center.
My company also lacks any official overtime (for salaried employees) or comp time (for anyone) policies. In theory we have time cards... but they're electronic, and are only filed by salaried employees in order to judge billing of clients. Since nothing I do is directly billable to clients, I don't (nor does any one else in my--the IT--department, who have shared those excessive hours for the most part).
Is the sense that I should insist there be official notation of how many hours a week I work if I want to have any hope of being fairly compensated?
Do you have a
If you were a contactor and/or paid by the hour, with all due respect, why in the hell did you not bring this up with your employeer immediately. Why did you work 500 hours (over three monts worth) and not say anything until you got fired (excuse me, "left the company")?
Every place I worked where I was paid by the hour made me specify how many regular hours I worked and how many overtime hours I worked with a clear explaination of the overtime policy right above where you sign the time sheet.
I and thousands of us here have been screw over by an employer (or two, or three), but this is unfortunately is your own damn fault.
If you'd been paid that overtime, you'd have paid more income taxes, right?
Give the tax collection agencies a call. Most of them have a tips hotline.
Also call the national department of labor, and your state's department of labor.
I will note that based on stories related to me, this sort of fraud seems to be common in the Resterant industry. The stories I've heard were from a waiter who turend in each of his ex-employers to the state, and collected fat back wage checkes each time. Perhaps you should research this on a Waiter oriented web site.
WOW! /.'s target advertising is brilliant.
As I read this topic on overtime the banner ad has links for:
Time Card/Overtime Calculator Software" to help you track it,
Woodley and McGillivary overtime lawyers and
Edwards and George overtime lawyers to help you sue for it and
Career Builders to help you find a new job when you are done with the lawyers.
~~~~~~~
"You are not remembered for doing what is expected of you." - Atul Chitnis
There are an awful lot of salaried, non-manangement people who've been working bazillions of hours of unpaid overtime.
AFAIK, this is fully permitted by law; overtime pay is specified in the terms of their employment contracts.
If you know of a specific federal law that mandates pay, regardless of exempt status, I (and 60 million other salary-slaves) would certainly appreciate a link to the relevant law.
Karma
Currently the top two articles on "Ask Slashdot" are:
That's funny, that is.
My advice is this: quit being such a whiney gayhole. Did you have a contract with the company saying you would get paid overtime? No. You worked the extra hours to get the job done and that's what everyone in interesting professional jobs does. If you were a garbage man then I might be able to see your point...you would expect to be paid per hour worked. But a software position is more task oriented. By that, I mean instead of being expected to work 40 hour/week, you're expected to finish 1 project per quarter (or whatever arbitrary number your manager decides someone in your position should be capable of). If you can't complete the number of required projects in the time given then there's no question: you MUST work overtime and not expect to be compensated for it!
Just one more example of CmdrTaco and his crew reposting the same article. Happens all the time...
You should try the labor board, it isn't fast, but neither is the court system. You file a complaint against the company, they determine if you are professional or not, as in job position. They investigate the company, and they check all the employees not just your times. If they discover you are due overtime they fine the company and force them to pay you the overtime.
They have guidlines for what a professional position is. Give it a shot...its free.
If ignorance is bliss, the world is full of blissful people
Why oh why does Slashdot keep running this kind of drivel. If you have an employment dispute, or a possible employment dispute, CALL A %$^! LAWYER. Pick up the phone and call his or her secretary and make an appointment. Bring your time records and pay stubs, which you kept (you didn't leave them at work, right?) If you have some irrational fear of lawyers, you might possibly get halfway decent advice at your state's labor board such as the California Department of Labor Standards Enforcement aka The State Labor Commissioner.
Yeah, right. .
I was involved in a labor dispute where it was CLEARLY a hostile workplace (people being screamed at and struck) and there were several employees who stood up, went to a lawyer, got a hearing, fought like hell and lost. No real reason - and the final ruling was 'unjustified'
This same business has been through three changes of employees since - I don't think anyone at the Colorado Labor Board is losing any sleep over it.
Abusive employers seem to flourish in Colorado... might be the huge glut of job-hungry folks moving here.
California also has some of their own additions, if you live there look into them.
4 1/29CFR541.3.htm
http://www.dol.gov/dol/allcfr/ESA/Title_29/Part_5
Not many people outside of operations environments are non-exempt in IT. As such, they are paid for their skill, and not their time.
Dan
a group of employees including myself got such a case settled about 10 years ago. But you will need some luck on your side. You will need your time sheets documenting your overtime. And now the luck part. typically, an employer will have rules (like a behaviour guidelines/holiday leave policy etc) and will spell things out for non-professional staff such as secretaries, admin support staff etc and a set of guideliness for professional employees etc. if you have proof that they ever changed your employment class ie treated you like an hourly employee when you are on a salary they are toast. In our case the employer did two stupid things: the company docked one programmer 1 days worth of pay for taking a two hour lunch and wrote a memo demanding that professional employees should routinely work 15-20 hours of overtime a week.
I think the only way one can reasonably expect to confront their management and seriously expect compensation is if the entirety of the IT department goes in together and acts *gasp* almost like a labor union. This is a very dangerous move, and will definitely trigger threats by the employer and maybe a few token dismissals to drive the point home. But they cannot afford to lose their whole IT department at once and if everyone sticks to their guns, real change can happen.
I guarantee, if you work in an IT department, you work with more than a few pussies who will cave. At least that's been my experience. Your 'friends' would be more than happy to stab you in the back if their jobs were on the line. Strong moral character and c programming skills aren't strongly correlated. I think some of my coworkers would rather take it in the back door from the boss than stick up for themselves. And they make fun of 'dumb' Teamsters.
.. Say 'Listen, [insert expletive or name. I suggest 'Jackhole'], I've got 502.75 hours of unpaid overtime. Documented. You raked my ass over the coals with a [layoff/firing/downsizing], and the way State law figures, you owe me $5.71 million in cash and valuable prizes.
Do you want to continue being a [expletive/jackhole], and pay a bloodsucking shark so I can just wring it out of your dying corporate corpse with interest anyway, or do you want to simply pay me 4.67 million and toss in a used Maserati so I won't open a can off class action whoopass on you?
I know Bob in Networking had 747.14 hours of overtime last year, and I'm sure he could use a quality used Lotus instead of putting a new alternator in his Camry. Do you want me to call Bob? Or Gina, in Support?
Or Alfie, the whacko that peed in the punch bowl and groped the VP after four vodka tonics at the company party? He's just gotten out of the rubber room the layoff put him in, I'm sure he'll consult with his friend Old Kentucky Shark and drop by looking to have a good time in his old cubicle after I tell him you owe him three Porsche and a Mercedes, plus whatever is behind door number three in Today's Showcase.. I think he left a back door in the accounting system..
Oh, no.. You [expletives/jackholes, perhaps now is a time to throw in 'asshats'] shouldn't take this as a threat. I'm not threatening anything! How do I know if I'll push some of your psychotic disgruntled ex-employees over the edge? How am I an expert on what the courts will do when Lisa, who wrote your new property management system in her free time, and I'm sure would love to know she still owns it because you dumbasses never made her sign the IP agreement, sues you?
We're all reasonable people here.. Just give me what you owe me, before I beat it out of your cold, lifeless body with a pitchfork wielding lawyer, and then set the pack of dogs on you.
.sig: Now legally binding!
i've taken time to read the federal law on the DOL web site in the past as well as some discussion on HR related web sites. while IANAL, this is the jist of what i read:
it is hard to legally declare an employee exempt and make it stick. the professional clause, which is usually used in regard to IT employees, is shaky at best. the other common one, management, is easier. however, it takes more than just 'manager' in an employee's title. they must spend a minimum of a given percentage of their time in management related activities. i recall this being between 40 and 60%. note, however, this is not in the law, but in discussion and case studies by the DOL and are provided as a guideline.
there are very specific exemptions for time-and-one-half for programmers and analysts. given how the law is written, i suspect it would be hard to extend this to net admins, support people, etc. furthermore, the exemption for programmers and analysts is contingent on their effective hourly rate being at least 6.5 times minimum wage and only exempts from time-and-one-half, instead making their overtime merely straight time. it would seem to me that if programmers and analysts are explicitly mentioned in the law, that they do _not_ qualify for the 'professional' qualification.
likewise, because of the mention of programmers and analysts, which are arguably closer to professional than support people, i would argue that they don't qualify either.
and, employment contracts do _not_ trump law. you can no more agree to work for less than minimum wage than you can give away any other right, such as to time-and-one-half for over 40 hours. state law also can't trump federal law, although it can make it more strict (eg: time-and-one-half for greater than 8 hours in one day, etc).
there is little doubt this would have to be argued strongly as it is exceedingly commonplace in the industry to consider IT people as exempt.
i also don't know to what extent it would help employers hold on to exempt status for their employees when they are treated more that way. for example, if you are free to come and go whenever during the day, have flexible hours, have a flexible time and length for lunch, have the ability to work less than 8 hours one day because you work more than that other days, etc. if you are held to a strict set of hours, lunch break, etc., i think a claim that you have been improperly classified as exempt would be easier to win.
anyway, just some thoughts. definitely read the law (fed and state) and contact an attorney and/or fed or state labor board if you think you might have a claim.
(no i have not ever filed a claim on any of this -- i have been in a position to consider it and decided it wasn't worth the hassle, better to just leave that job and move on.)
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You know, if you are going to have a sig, spelling it right would be nice ....
Its difficult to reply to this, but you might want to look a little closer at the FLSA Section 13. http://www.flsa.com/computer.html Overtime pay requirements come down to whether you qualify as a Excempt or Non-Exempt employee. Excempt employees which most IT jobs fall, aren't required to be paid any compensation beyond their salary.
Here, as an owner of an IT company, I can get countless hours of free labor from my employees by requiring 60, 80, 100 or more hours a week, and fire those who don't give it to me! I can even pay them a pittance and get away with it because IT employees are "exempt".
And if the state or federal government actually do take me to task over it legally, then I can outsource to India, or some other country, no doubt where child labor is legal, wages are even lower, and employee safety laws are nonexistent.
So that's why they call it FREE MARKET Capitalism!!
--- Grow a pair, liberals... stop letting the Republicans bully you!
I had a friend who was in a similar situation. He put in a bunch of unpaid overtime over the course of two years, thinking he was an exempt employee and part of the management team. Then the company signed a huge deal and passed out bonuses to the Managers, and he was screwed over.
He contacted the state Labor Board, and they pretty much took the case and did everything for him. He didn't have any time sheets or anything, but the company had records of his security card in/out punches, and the weekly time log he had filled out showing how many hours had been spent per week on each of his projects. That was sufficient, the company paid him his back OT. Which turned out to be about 3 times what his bonus would have been.
I am NOT a man!
I am a free number!
While I seriously doubt you can sue for your overtime pay, you may be able to sue if they failed to disclose that your job would require such a large amount of overtime before you accepted the job. 500 hours is quite a lot and I'm sure you'll have some legal recourse as long as you can prove it, and that you were required to work that long.
Mickey and Goofy have problems too. http://www.miceage.com/kevinyee/ky121102a.htm
This would have never happened.
I find it amusing at all the people who complained in this discussion about how crappy unions are, but so many of us are getting screwed.
How about it?.
"All I ever wanted was to see Larry Wall give Bill Gates a Perl necklace."
http://www.eisenschmidt.org/jweisen
according to federal law, if you are salaried, then you are not eligable for overtime. if you have a "white collar" job, you are also not eligable for overtime. HOWEVER, if you are paid by the hour, and you aren't paid for 40 hrs a week if you work less than 40 hrs a week, by federal labor law, your employer is required to pay you overtime. this is employee right which may not be signed away via an employee contract.