National Jun 15, 2016

DOL announces final rule updating the FLSA's overtime standard

The U.S. Department of Labor announced the publication of its long-awaited final rule updating the Fair Labor Standards Act’s overtime standard. Under the final rule, all insurance agency employees who are not producers/sales employees and who earn less than $47,476 annually ($913 per week) must be hourly employees and must be paid overtime (time-and-a-half) for any hours they work over 40. This figure is a slight decrease from the $50,440 annually ($970 a week) originally proposed by the DOL when it released the proposed rule in July 2015.

When the DOL first proposed the increase, it received over 270,000 comments that led some to believe the DOL would lower the threshold closer to the $23,660 annually ($455 per week) that currently is in effect. In addition to increasing the salary threshold, the new regulation also will establish a mechanism for updating salary and compensation levels automatically every three years. This is designed to prevent perceived inequities in the threshold, as prior to this change the DOL had not updated the regulation since 2004. The new rule will go into effect Thursday, Dec. 1, 2016.

In order to answer some questions you may have, PIA National recently developed a frequently asked questions document, which can be found here. If you should have any further questions, please contact the PIA Industry Resource Center.

6/16

Think PIA first