Exempt Unpaid Time Off

SusanHR

I would like some feedback on this situation. Our company gives both sick and vacation leave to both exempt and non-exempt employees. We have an exempt employee that has used all of his PTO for the year. He was out sick on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, and worked Thursday, Friday, and half a day on both Saturday and Sunday, all in the same week. Our payroll covers Monday through Sunday. How should his time be paid according to FLSA guidelines?

marc

[font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON 08-22-05 AT 10:23AM (CST)[/font][br][br]Interesting question:

Ordinarily, you can deduct whole days of absence from an exempts pay in the presence of a bona fide sick leave policy, which you have.

Your scenario has the EE working 2 full days and 2 part days during the week, which I would say translates as 4 work days for purposes of the FLSA week of pay.

My thinking is that you normally ahve a 5 day work week, even though FLSA lets you work exempts 7 days a week, 24 hours a day. I would say you allowed the EE to make up two of the days missed, but not the third.

Others have a better handle on this, but you might want to check out this web address:

[url]http://www.dol.gov/esa/regs/compliance/whd/fairpay/fs17g_salary.htm[/url]

"Circumstances in Which the Employer May Make Deductions from Pay

Deductions from pay are permissible when an exempt employee: is absent from work for one or more full days for personal reasons other than sickness or disability; for absences of one or more full days due to sickness or disability if the deduction is made in accordance with a bona fide plan, policy or practice of providing compensation for salary lost due to illness; to offset amounts employees receive as jury or witness fees, or for military pay; for penalties imposed in good faith for infractions of safety rules of major significance; or for unpaid disciplinary suspensions of one or more full days imposed in good faith for workplace conduct rule infractions. Also, an employer is not required to pay the full salary in the initial or terminal week of employment, or for weeks in which an exempt employee takes unpaid leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act."

Edit. Forgot to make the notification box.

HRLASS

I hadn't actually thought of this before, but I have seen it at our company also and the partial days on Saturday and Sunday can lead to abuse. I've seen it manipulated before. If you want to keep from paying for full days on weekends for a few hours work, require the employees to ask permission first, or limit the weekend work to 1 part time day. We do not have a policy, but if someone's been sick with or without PTO, we prefer that they not come in on the weekend and use that time to rest so they will be back to full steam on Monday. Most of the time when they come in on the weekend when they've been sick, they will be unable to work a full day at the start of the next week and you pay for more partial days.

HRCalico

1) I know both marc and 'Lass meant to say this, but welcome to the forum! :>)

2) I think marc is probably right when he says four work days, which means you would only deduct one full day's pay. His citation is as close as I could get.

3) Hope your attendance policy has something to say about this type of behavior. Also, remember you can "discipline" for not getting their work done. Exempt means you work as much as you have to work. Someone had a post a while back about having employees "bank" some time for emergencies - it is frustrating when they burn it up and then don't have it when they need it.

HRLASS

Calico -
Thanks for covering for us -
Susan - Welcome to the Forum!

Carolyn

njjel

According to the regs, when an exempt ee works part of any one day they must be paid for the full day even if they have used up all of their accrued leave time. So they would be paid for 4 days.