Emergency Situations Can Create Wage And Hour Liability

Originally published November 5, 2012

With the hurricane hitting the East Coast and creating havoc for businesses trying to rebuild as quickly as possible, it is important to remember that there are no emergency exceptions to wage and hour laws.  When a company goes into crisis mode, it is important to maintain the normal safeguards and policies that ensure the proper calculation of work time and payment of overtime.

The following are a few tips to avoid the common mistakes and pitfalls that employers face during these difficult times: 

• Employers are only obliged to pay non-exempt workers for actual hours worked.  If weather shuts down their place of employment, the employer is typically not required to pay any wages, absent a contractual agreement.  Exempt employees, however, must be paid for their entire work week if they perform any work during the week and they are prevented from working because of no fault of their own (i.e. the business is