3rd shift OT

Marcia

We've recently started having overnight shifts that cross over the end of our payweek (Monday through Sunday midnight). When someone works Sunday night (10pm to 6 am), their hours after midnight are counted towards the next week's hours. Sometimes, this will send them into OT in the new week. Can we designate a different payweek for the 3rd shift only (i.e. starts at noon on Monday rather than at 12 am on Monday)? If so, what notification would we have to give the employees? Thanks!

Hatchetman

[font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON 02-19-02 AT 05:27PM (CST)[/font][p]In FLSA, a work week is applicable to non-exempt employees and jobs. An employer may have different work weeks for different jobs. You would have to standardize the work week for those employees who worked the 10 p.m. to 6 a.m., shift. DOL regulations do permit an employer to have more than one work week in its operations based upon the situation for different groups of employees -- 29CFR778.105. Remember, the purpose of the work week is to establish when "overtme" is to be paid. Thus the change would have to be permanent for the third shift employees and not intended to avoid paying overtime. Changing the work week for the third shift would make sense if it is to allow for better "bookkeeping" or accountability of work time.

You would have to give sufficient notice to the employees and phase in the change over a two week period. The intent would be that under either work week, the employee would NOT lose out of overtime if that were the situation.

I am not familiar with Texas law (I recognize the possibility that NO ONE really knows what Texas law is -- it's almost like California, eh? x;-) ). So, I do not know if Texas law is more restrictive on the employer in regard to work weeks than federal FLSA.