Wage & Hour Counsel : Wage & Hour Lawyer & Attorney : Littler Mendelson Law Firm : Employment Law, Labor Relations

In Allen v. McWane, the Fifth Circuit considered whether an employer is required to pay for pre- and post-shift donning and doffing of protective gear under Section 203(o) of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) where the company and the union never discussed the issue, and where the employees (and union representatives) attested that they were not even aware that changing time could potentially be compensated under the FLSA. Section 203(o) of the FLSA provides that an employer does not have to pay its employees for time “changing clothes or washing at the beginning or end of each workday ... by custom or practice under a bona fide collective bargaining agreement.” 29 U.S.C. § 203(o).

• Email This
• Print
• Trackbacks
• Share Link

In Sepulveda v. Allen Family Foods, Inc., the Fourth Circuit held that the company does not have to pay its employees for time spent donning and doffing because it was the subject of collective bargaining between the union—the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 27—and the company. Specifically, the issue in this case was whether time spent donning and doffing protective gear at a unionized poultry processing plant constituted “changing clothes” within the meaning of Section 203(o) of the Fair Labor Standards Act, 29 U.S.C. § 201 et seq. This section provides that that an employer does not have to pay its employees for time “changing clothes or washing at the beginning or end of each workday ... by the express terms of or by custom or practice under a bona fide collective bargaining agreement.” 29 U.S.C. § 203(o).

• Email This
• Print
• Trackbacks
• Share Link

In Collins v. Heritage Wine Cellars Ltd. (7th Cir., No. 09-1181, Dec. 21, 2009), the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals analyzed the extent to which drivers who delivered wine exclusively within the State of Illinois were engaged in interstate commerce and, therefore, not entitled to overtime under the Motor Carrier Act exemption to the Fair Labor Standards Act. Specifically, this exemption from overtime applies to employees of a motor carrier if “property ... [is] transported by [the] motor carrier between a place in a State and a place in another State,” provided the employees “engage in activities of a character directly affecting the safety of operation of motor vehicles in the transportation on the public highways of passengers or property in interstate or foreign commerce within the meaning of the Motor Carrier Act.” As the court noted, “[t]he shipment itself must be in some sense interstate commerce (transportation between a place in a state and a place in another state).”

• Email This
• Print
• Trackbacks
• Share Link