Exempt Status
Hello,
If you ask your employer what your status is, exempt or Non-exempt are they required to tell you? If they are what can you do if your employer refuses to tell you? Because it will raise questions as to why i'm asking.
Answers (1)
Exempt status should be obvious
I assume that your question refers to whether you are considered exempt from the overtime provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act. That is the common understanding of the use of the terms exempt and non-exempt.
The question whether your employer is treating you as exempt should be obvious from your paycheck. To be an exempt employee, in most cases you must be paid a salary rather than an hourly wage. If your employer pays you time and a half after 40 hours per week, you are obviously considered non-exempt. If you are being required to work more than 40 hours per week without being paid any premium for the extra time, your employer is treating you as exempt. Refusing to tell you how they view you is being less than cooperative, but it is how they pay you that matters.
Non-exempt salaried employees are entitled to overtime, but not at an hourly rate based upon a forty hour workweek. For example, if your salary is $400 per week, that is not the equivalent of $10 per hour. On that salary, if you work 50 hours in a particular week, your hourly rate for that week is $400 divided by fifty hours, or $8
per hour. You would be entitled to an additional $4 for each of the last ten hours worked in that week. This is obviously a lot less than the $15 per hour you might have expected.
Certain exemptions involving computer programming work do not require that you be paid a salary, but have a higher minimum wage requirement. You may want to go to the U.S. Department of Labor for more information.
posted by Francis Fanning | Oct 29, 2007 1:49 PM [EST]
I assume that your question refers to whether you are considered exempt from the overtime provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act. That is the common understanding of the use of the terms exempt and non-exempt.
The question whether your employer is treating you as exempt should be obvious from your paycheck. To be an exempt employee, in most cases you must be paid a salary rather than an hourly wage. If your employer pays you time and a half after 40 hours per week, you are obviously considered non-exempt. If you are being required to work more than 40 hours per week without being paid any premium for the extra time, your employer is treating you as exempt. Refusing to tell you how they view you is being less than cooperative, but it is how they pay you that matters.
Non-exempt salaried employees are entitled to overtime, but not at an hourly rate based upon a forty hour workweek. For example, if your salary is $400 per week, that is not the equivalent of $10 per hour. On that salary, if you work 50 hours in a particular week, your hourly rate for that week is $400 divided by fifty hours, or $8
per hour. You would be entitled to an additional $4 for each of the last ten hours worked in that week. This is obviously a lot less than the $15 per hour you might have expected.
Certain exemptions involving computer programming work do not require that you be paid a salary, but have a higher minimum wage requirement. You may want to go to the U.S. Department of Labor for more information.
posted by Francis Fanning | Oct 29, 2007 1:49 PM [EST]
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