As of January 1, 2020, exempt employees must earn a minimum salary of $35,568 annually ($684 weekly) to satisfy one of three critical requirements to qualify as “overtime exempt”. This change was a little over 50% higher than the previous minimum salary level of $23,660, according to Littler. Although it is still under review, the U.S. Department of Labor recently announced a notice of proposed rulemaking that would restore and extend overtime protections, guaranteeing overtime pay for most salaried workers earning less than $1,059 per week, about $55,000 per year. 

These are significant changes that can have a huge economic impact on organizations. However, as most employers are aware, the minimum salary is just the math - whereas the “duties test” is where most employers struggle. Determining whether an employee has enough “white collar” responsibility to be exempt from overtime pay can be a difficult and time consuming decision to make - especially when the clock is ticking. 

Building an internal program that leverages ComplianceHR’s OT solution can be an effective remedy. The first step is to lay the groundwork for your Overtime Classification program.  Below are some important questions for your consideration.

• What is the specific use case where you want to use the technology to support your exempt / non-exempt program?
  Use Case Examples: 
  • I’d like to evaluate a new position to determine if it should be classified as exempt vs. non-exempt
  • I need to re-evaluate an employee who has just moved states/jurisdictions
  • I'd like to clean up my job codes/positions so they're consistent and aligned with the work people are doing
  • I'd like to understand the risk of classifying my existing employee population as exempt by completing an audit
  • I'd like to know whether it's more cost effective to adjust comp and move an employee to exempt or keep paying them overtime

• How risk averse is your organization?  Knowing the risk your organization is willing to assume, will guide your decisions for how to leverage the technology for each use case.
  Decision Examples: 
  • Higher Risk: We are confident that employees in the same position, across multiple states, are performing the same job duties and are willing to evaluate one position in a specific state and apply that to all employees in that position
  • Lower Risk: We want to ensure we are compliant for a position, for each state that the position is held, to ensure it is classified properly according to compensation and duties performed by each individual in the position

• Who will manage the program internally?
  • Only individuals with access to the platform will see report results. 
• Who will complete the questionnaires? 
• Will evaluations be entered individually or in batches of up to 50? 
  • If batches are required, consider a standard naming convention to organize your files. Next, review the  CSV Formatting Guidelines within the ComplianceHR Knowledge Center. 
• Who will evaluate the report results and be responsible for taking any remediation steps? 
• Who will have final approval?