Employees who need to express breast milk at work require more than informal permission from a helpful manager. Federal law establishes workplace protections for many nursing employees, and state or local laws may provide additional rights. Employers need a consistent process that gives employees suitable break time, access to an...
Shift Differential Pay: How to Set Rates and Apply Them Correctly
Businesses that operate outside standard daytime hours often find it harder to attract and retain employees for evenings, nights, weekends, holidays, or other demanding shifts. One common solution is to offer extra compensation to employees who work during those periods. This additional amount, often called shift differential pay or a...
Absenteeism Rate: The Formula and What to Do With the Number
Every business expects employees to miss work occasionally. People become ill, attend medical appointments, care for family members, take protected leave, and face emergencies that cannot be scheduled. Occasional absence is a normal part of managing a workforce. Problems begin when unplanned absences become frequent enough to disrupt operations, increase...
Employee Time Tracking Policy: What to Include With a Template
Accurate time records help a business pay employees correctly, manage staffing, understand labour costs, and comply with wage and hour requirements. Without a clear policy, employees may be unsure when to clock in, how to record remote work, whether training time counts, or what to do after forgetting to clock...
What Counts as Work Before and After an Employee’s Shift
Most employees think their workday starts when they clock in. Most employers think the same thing. Both are often wrong. Starting a computer, putting on safety equipment, waiting for a handoff report, delivering a package to a truck after clocking out. These minor activities may seem inconsequential. However, the federal...
What Does a DOL Wage and Hour Investigation Ask For?
A Wage and Hour investigation can feel intimidating because employers often do not know what the investigator will ask for, how far back the review may go, or which parts of their payroll system will receive the most attention. The U.S. Department of Labor's Wage and Hour Division, commonly called...
How to Detect Buddy Punching in the Time Data You Already Have
Employee time records are supposed to provide a straightforward picture of when people start work, take breaks, finish their shifts, and accumulate paid hours. But time data is only useful when the punches accurately represent the person who actually worked. One problem that can interfere with that accuracy is buddy...
Time Tracking for Remote Hourly Employees Without Surveillance Software
Remote work has changed where employees work, but it has not removed the need for accurate timekeeping. For hourly employees, employers still need reliable records of working time so that payroll can be calculated correctly and applicable wage and hour requirements can be followed. At the same time, employees generally...
Holiday Pay for Hourly Employees: What’s Required and What’s Policy
Holidays can create more payroll questions than almost any other part of the work calendar. Employees may wonder whether they are entitled to a paid day off, whether working on a holiday means time-and-a-half pay, or whether holiday hours count toward overtime. Employers, meanwhile, need to know which payments are...
On-Call and Standby Time: When You Have to Pay for It
On-call work is common in industries where problems do not always happen during normal business hours. Healthcare facilities may need employees available for emergencies, property management companies may need someone ready to respond to maintenance issues, and technology businesses may require staff to handle system failures at night. Restaurants, security...