Employment Law Update: Is a New Overtime Rule on Its Way?

I’ve been eagerly anticipating new developments on the federal overtime rules since last year, and after almost a year of inactivity, it appears there may be a revised rule on the way.

Here’s the background: early last year, the Department of Labor announced a revision to the federal overtime requirements which would expand workers’ eligibility to receive overtime pay, as further discussed in this post: New Federal Rule Increases Employee Eligibility for Overtime Pay. But then in November of 2016, a federal judge in Texas issued an injunction preventing the new rule from taking effect as scheduled in December 2016.

The latest development is that the Department of Labor has requested public comment on the proposed overtime rule, which suggests that the rule will be further revised sometime in the near future. If you’re interested in submitting a public comment for consideration, comments can be submitted online at http://www.regulations.gov or by mail addressed to Melissa Smith, Director of the Division of Regulations, Legislation, and Interpretation, Wage and Hour Division, U.S. Department of Labor, Room S-3502, 200 Constitution Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20210.

The deadline for submitting a comment is on or before September 25, 2017.

Please keep in mind that all comments will be a matter of public record and available in unedited form online, therefore comments should be drafted with that in mind and confidential business information should not be submitted as a part of the comment.

Matt Landis is an attorney at Russell, Krafft & Gruber, LLP, in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. He received his law degree from Widener University Commonwealth Law School and works regularly with business owners and entrepreneurs.