Under the Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”) and North Carolina Wage and Hour Act (“NCWHA”), United States’ employees are to be paid at least minimum wage for all hours worked and overtime pay for all hours worked over 40 per workweek. The overtime rules require payment for those hours in excess of 40 per workweek in an amount of time and one-half the regular rate of pay. However, under both acts, those employed as bona fide executive, administrative, professional, outside-sales, and highly-compensated employees are exempt from minimum wage and overtime requirements.
We recently represented a group of employees who did not receive overtime despite not qualifying as highly compensated employees. We secured a settlement of approximately $70,000.00 for the four workers.
The qualify as a “highly-compensated employee” under FLSA guidelines the employee must (a) earn a total salary of at least $100,000 per year, with at least a weekly salary of $455 per week; (b) primarily perform duties consisting of office or non-manual work; and (c) customarily and regularly perform at least one of the exempt duties of an exempt executive, administrative, or professional employee.
Importantly, the Department of Labor plans on modifying the salary requirement for highly-compensated workers from $100,000 to $122,148 per year.
The attorneys at Maginnis Law help highly compensated employees throughout North Carolina recover owed wages. Employers who violate the FLSA or NCWHA may be subject to penalties including liquidated damages (“doubling” the amount of owed wages) and the payment of an employee’s attorneys’ fees. This allows our firm to regularly handle wage cases on a contingency basis, meaning employees pay no fees unless we recover owed wages. To discuss your wage case, call us (919) 526-0450 or send a message through our contact page.
