Okay my dh is an exempt employee and has been offered a "bonus project" that requires him to work either a saturday or sunday for a full day. but instead of paying him normal overtime or for an extra day they want to give him a "bonus" for this work. The amt is rather insulting when you consider that bonus tax takes 38% away and it is about 1/2 his salary for a normal day. Other people at work have accepted this saying that they could make him work it without any extra pay..

My question is "is it true that exempt employees can be made to work overtime without pay when they have been working at the same job for 9 years and always worked a 40 hr week?"

I can't seem to find the right info..

By Debbie on Thursday, August 14, 2008 - 05:19 pm:

I guess I don't know what you mean by exempt?? Are you saying he is a salaried employee that has always worked 40 hours?? If he is salaried, then they could make him work extra hours and not pay him anything more.

By Tarable on Thursday, August 14, 2008 - 05:42 pm:

yes he is salaried.

By Debbie on Thursday, August 14, 2008 - 05:48 pm:

My understanding is that if he is salaried, then they can make him work whatever hours they want. The only situation that they couldn't, would be if he is a contracted employee, and it is in writing that he only work 40 hours. It is actually pretty nice of them to offer him a "bonus". Most companies wouldn't.

By Vicki on Thursday, August 14, 2008 - 07:47 pm:

I agree that it is also my understanding that salaried employees are not paid any overtime at all and are expected to work the overtime if need be. I agree that it is VERY nice of them to offer the bonus for doing it. No place that dh has ever worked on a salary gave him anything over hours over 40!

By Ginny~moderator on Thursday, August 14, 2008 - 07:47 pm:

The first question is, is he legally classified as "exempt". Some of the factors that come into play are: If he misses a day of work, does he get paid his full salary anyhow? If he comes in late, does his paycheck get docked? Is he a supervisor? Does he have managerial responsibilities and authority? To answer those questions, you'd have to go to the Texas state organization that regulates such things - probably the Dept. of Labor.

Here is a good, reasonably short definition of exempt employees, based on federal labor law: The U.S. Department of Labor specifically designates certain classes of workers as exempt, including executives, administrative personnel, outside salespeople, highly skilled computer-related employees and licensed professionals, such as doctors, lawyers, architects, engineers and certified public accountants, among others. In addition, managers who hire and fire employees and who spend less than half their time performing the same duties as their employees are typically also exempt employees. In general, the more responsibility and independence or discretion an employee has, the more likely the employee is to be considered exempt.

But the most important question is: If he refuses to work this extra day, does he jeopardize his job? And if he does, is that OK?

As others note, if he is legally "exempt", they don't have to pay him a bonus at all. Some employers will, some won't, and it's the employer's choice. How long he has worked there, and his normal work week have nothing to do with it.

By Karen~admin on Thursday, August 14, 2008 - 07:52 pm:

My DH is salaried, and during his busy times, he works weekends, and 10 hour days - no additional pay. By the same token, he is not docked for missing work due to appointments, etc., works shorter days when he is less busy, etc.

By Kaye on Thursday, August 14, 2008 - 08:34 pm:

Salaried DH here. He mostly works 45 hour weeks, on occasion he puts in 60-70 hr weeks. They don't pay him extra. He is working a project in the spring we think, that will be offered project pay", which is very cool we think.

So I agree with the others, they could call him in, or basically let him go if he doesn't show. I would take the bonus and put it on the calendar.

By Yjja123 on Thursday, August 14, 2008 - 08:50 pm:

My hubby is salaried and a typical work week is 70+ hours.
His bonuses are severely taxed also. Though, we do seem to get some of that back when we file our taxes.
To answer your question, yes he can be asked to work more hours. At least they are compensating him for it.

By Tarable on Thursday, August 14, 2008 - 11:37 pm:

Well when he complained that they offered me the same "bonus" for the same day at work when he makes about 25000 more than me they raised the pay and he doesn't mind working the hours.. I doubt that his job would have been in jeopardy if he refused but management would not have liked it. I guess we have it pretty easy, just annoyed that they sprung this on us and he feels that he can't refuse for our plans that weekend because he is the main programmer on the project that they want us to work on. So we are changing our plans to this weekend so we can work next weekend or at least part of it.

Thanks for the input..

And he is exempt and no they don't dock us for dr appts.