Seventh Circuit Jumps Ahead of SCOTUS, Rules Pharmaceutical Sales Reps Exempt from Overtime—Jackson Lewis’ Noel Tripp
As is common knowledge, and as I wrote last week, the USDOL has proposed to raise the minimum salary required for exempt status for the Part 541 white collar exemptions to more than $1000 per week. Although that will...more
On January 11, 2023, the First Circuit (the federal Court of Appeals covering MA, RI, NH, ME and Puerto Rico) issued its decision in Walsh v. Unitil Service Corp., which scrutinized an employer’s evaluation of whether its...more
In 2020, the Department of Labor (DOL), in its guidance issued under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974, as amended (ERISA), remained principally focused on the development of its Fiduciary Rule 3.0 and...more
The U.S. Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division (WHD) issued two new opinion letters on January 8, 2021, bringing the number of “lame duck” wage and hour opinion letters—issued since Election Day 2020—to six....more
The last several years have been quite worrisome to me, as a management side practitioner, on the issue of USDOL agency-initiated liquidated damages assessments. It used to be that only when the USDOL took an entity to court...more
The federal Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”) codifies the employment relationship as it relates to the payment of wages. The amount of overtime compensation for salaried employees is subject to certain exemptions, one of...more
The hospitality industry is an increasingly popular target for enforcement actions by government agencies, not to mention lawsuits by plaintiffs’ attorneys. To help avoid three common wage and hour issues that come up too...more
I have often blogged about the usefulness of USDOL (or any DOL) Opinion Letters and I have lamented that this procedure was stopped under President Obama. I hailed that the new Secretary of Labor was going back to it. Well,...more
In late June 2017, the United States Department of Labor (DOL) announced it would be reinstating Opinion Letters issued by its Wage and Hour Division, which was a practice that had ceased back in 2010. This announcement is...more
On October 30, 2017, the Department of Labor (DOL) indicated that it intends to appeal to the Fifth Circuit a federal district court ruling from 2016 that invalidated Obama-era overtime changes....more
There have been so many cases involving employees in the financial services industries and their exempt status or lack thereof. In another variation on this theme, Provident Savings Bank is seeking review by the US Supreme...more
Seyfarth Synopsis: Earlier this month, the Ninth Circuit chose to side with the Second Circuit, and not the Sixth Circuit, to opine that mortgage underwriters fail to meet the FLSA’s administrative exemption from overtime...more
On April 6, 2016, the Department of Labor (DOL) issued a widely anticipated final regulation that redefines who is a “fiduciary” of certain employee benefit and other plans for purposes of the Employee Retirement Income...more
In its February 16, 2017 decision in Tsyn v. Wells Fargo Advisors, LLC, Case No. 14-cv-02552-LB, the federal district court for the Northern District of California confirmed that licensed financial advisors qualified for the...more
The number one class action lawsuit for several years running is FLSA claims for overtime pay. The lawsuits can be based on inaccurately recorded or calculated work hours, work hours before “going on the clock” or after...more
With just more than a year left in this administration, the U.S. Department of Labor (“DOL” or “Department”) has rolled out two major initiatives that promise to keep employers busy ensuring they are in compliance. First, in...more
Federal agencies now have the authority to interpret their own rules. On March 9, 2015, in Perez v. Mortgage Bankers Ass’n, No. 13-1041, slip op. (U.S. Mar. 9, 2015), the United States Supreme Court effectively gave...more
In 2004, the DOL revamped its regulations regarding the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) administrative exemption. In 2006, the Bush DOL issued an opinion letter finding that mortgage loan officers qualified for the...more
The legal ping-pong match between the Department of Labor (DOL) and the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) over whether mortgage loan officers are eligible for overtime appears to be at an end. The Supreme Court recently...more
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit recently vacated a 2010 interpretation of federal wage and hour law in which the Department of Labor (DOL) had concluded that mortgage loan officers do not...more
Is It Time To Deep-Six The “Administration-Production” Dichotomy? There is a very funny set of books under the title “Unuseless Japanese Inventions” by Kenji Kawakami. The books depict, in a matter-of-fact fashion, a...more