Can You Ask Hourly Employees to "Work" After Work: Paying for Cell Phone and Email Use

Description

With cell phone use and email accessibility virtually ubiquitous, what can be considered "working time?" If you require your hourly employees to be responsible for communicating via their cell phones and responding to emails after working hours, must you be compensating them for that time? What if it is just a few minutes or even seconds at a time and doesn't add up to even an hour's work, does that count? How do you calculate that time if responding to emails is expected but not explicitly dictated in company policy?

Courts continue to weigh in on these questions while employers struggle with compensating or not compensating employees for sometimes mundane duties done outside of working hours.

This 90-minute interactive audio conference will teach you the answers to these questions above and how crafting and enforcing compliant policies can lessen the risks of a potential wage and hour related lawsuit.
 

Program Highlights:

• What does "suffered or permitted to work" mean and why is it important?
• Can work be so insignificant or "de minimis" that is does not need to be compensated?
• Do I have to pay employees who check email on weekends against company policy?
•  Who is responsible if managers insist that employees stay in touch "off-the-books"?
• Is this only an issue for hourly workers?
• Do I have to pay for time to boot up the computer?
• How should I ask nonexempt employees to keep track of time spent worker outside the workplace?
• What can I do if employees don't return company equipment at the end of employment or damage i

Recording Date

Speakers

Daniel B. Abrahams, Esq., is a partner in the international law firm, Brown, Rudnick, Berlack, Israels LLP, where he regularly represents employers before the U.S. Department of Labor and in the courts. For more information on Daniel, please click here.

Shlomo D. Katz Esq., is Counsel in the Washington, D.C. office of the international law firm of Brown Rudnick LLP, where he practices wage and hour law, and commercial and government procurement law and litigation. For more information on Shlomo, please click here.

Presentation Materials

Listen and watch the presentation online or download the files below.