Staying compliant with the wide array of overtime regulations is essential for managers across all industries. However, it is especially critical for staffing agencies providing contingent workforce management services to their clients. In this scenario, both your managers as well as those of your clients need to understand the importance of this issue.
Wage and hour training for your managers ensures your agency avoids costly fines due to being out of compliance. In addition to hampering your balance sheet, tax penalties also potentially damage your agency’s reputation. The same concept also applies to your clients if you manage their contingent workforce operations.
Let’s examine the importance of ensuring your managers understand overtime compliance. We also cover resources for training your leadership on this critical topic. Remember, Timerack provides staffing agencies with state-of-the-art solutions to automate the time-tracking process. Our tools help make overtime compliance an easier process for staffing agencies and their clients.
How Can You Train Managers on Overtime Compliance?
Exploring Wage and Hour Laws
The federal government’s Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) details most overtime pay regulations for businesses. However, states also have their own laws that may supersede the dictates of the FLSA. Needless to say, this greatly increases the regulatory complexity for businesses with locations in multiple regions. It also highlights why staffing agencies providing contingent workforce management services must deeply understand these regulations.
The risks of running afoul of FLSA compliance remain critical and potentially costly, as highlighted above. For example, Merril Lynch recently paid $14 million to settle lawsuits related to not paying overtime to financial advisors. Similar examples of costly fines and penalties exist across the business world. As a result, these risks ultimately require you to ensure your managers receive sufficient wage and hour training.
Training Managers in Overtime Compliance reduces your FLSA Liability
In addition to lowering the risks of non-compliance, training your managers in overtime laws also reduces your FLSA liability. It allows using a good faith defense, noting that any non-compliance failed to violate the FLSA act by omission. In some cases, this results in that business avoiding any costly fines known as “liquidated damages.”
These fines typically get added to any unpaid overtime wages greatly increasing the total penalty suffered by a business. Providing a strong, well-documented overtime compliance training program ultimately helps businesses use the good faith defense. As a result, a smaller FLSA liability serves as sometimes overlooked benefit of overtime compliance training.
Ensure Your Overtime Compliance Training includes the Following Topics
An effective wage and hour training program needs to include the following subject matter to foster strong compliance. Use this information when vetting different courses on this topic. Choosing the right one for your staffing agency remains critical!
- Classifying Employees as Exempt or Non-Exempt: Your managers must clearly understand the overtime status of each employee. Non-exempt employees receive overtime pay based on the FLSA regulations.
- Other Duties Requiring Pay for Non-Exempt Employees: Non-exempt workers also receive pay for certain atypical work duties. These might include commuting time, working over a lunch hour, answering off-duty text messages, and more.
- Ensuring All Work Hours are Accurately Documented: While this topic seems obvious, sometimes managers overlook this issue. Leveraging a Timerack automated time-tracking solution ensures strong and secure timesheet documentation.
Resources for Overtime Compliance Training for Managers
Thankfully, a host of online resources exist for providing wage and hour training to your staffing agency’s managers. Notably, the federal government provides a FLSA training resource suitable for company leadership. It covers all aspects of the FLSA, including those overtime regulations.
Other useful topics for managers focus on flexible scheduling, minimum wage, and employee compensation. It remains a valuable resource at no cost to employers. Ensure your managers bookmark this link and regularly refer to it when questions arise.
Additionally, the U.S. Department of Labor also published a collection of videos covering the FLSA. Beyond overtime regulations, other topics include deductions and whether a business is required to follow the FLSA. Once again, this free resource remains valuable for managers now and in the future.
Finally, for another free resource, check out the FLSA Toolkit by John Hopkins University. It provides a detailed overview of the FLSA, covering many of the concepts discussed in this article. Needless to say, a host of paid FLSA training courses also exist, but the free options remain useful.
Timerack’s Time-Tracking Solutions make Overtime Compliance Easier
Timerack’s automated time-tracking solutions simplify the process of overtime compliance. We offer biometric time clock options, making attendance and time reporting seamless for your employees. When combined with managers that fully understand the FLSA, expect the risks of non-compliance to become yesterday’s news!
Helping your staffing agency optimize its time-tracking function ultimately simplifies FLSA compliance. The experienced professionals at Timerack want to help your staffing agency. We provide a state-of-the-art application suite and hardware serving as a secure option for your organization. Connect with us to schedule a demo.
