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pay workers for volunteer time

njjelnjjel 1,235 Posts
in HR & Employment Law Vote Up0Vote Down
We are a non profit NJ corporation and from time to time our hourly employees state they would like to volunteer their time and do outreach work or will volunteer to help paint an office after regular work hours. As they are our employees, I believe they have to be paid their normal rate of pay plus any overtime. Am I correct?
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  • 2 Comments sorted by Votes Date Added
  • TexasTexas 20 Posts
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    It is my understanding that if they are performing work other than their normal job, they can volunteer. If your accountant is counting money at a fundraiser s/he would have to be paid. If s/he is painting, it would be considered volunteer work.
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  • davidsdavids 427 Posts
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    I agree with Texas, you need to look at how similar the volunteer work is with the employee's paid duties. We use the position's EEO category as a starting place. If an employee who is a professional is volunteering to perform duties that fall into the trades category, we probably would not have an issue. If the voluteer work, however, was professional work, it would raise flags for us and we would investigate deeper.
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