Over the summer, the U.S. Supreme Court punted on the question of whether “Service Advisers” or “Service Writers” at auto dealerships fall within the Fair Labor Standards Act’s exemption for “any salesman, partsman, or mechanic primarily engaged in selling or servicing automobiles.” For those outside of the auto industry, these are the people who greet you when you pull into the service department and communicate with you about what work your car might need. Since the question of whether service advisers count as “salesmen” may not be definitively resolved for some time yet, many auto dealers find themselves looking for other overtime exemptions that may apply to these positions.
The Section 7(i) Exemption
The “white collar” exemptions for executive, administrative, and professional employees don’t fit because service advisers don’t perform the sorts of job duties that fall under those exemptions, and many of them are paid mostly on commission rather than on a salary basis. There is, however, another exemption that may apply to at least some service advisers. Section 7(i) of the FLSA creates an exemption that applies when all three of the following conditions are met:
- The employee must be employed by a retail or service establishment.
- The employee’s regular rate of pay must exceed one and one half times the minimum wage for every hour worked in a workweek in which any overtime hours are worked.
- More than half of the employee’s total earnings in a “representative period” must consist of “commissions.”
Regular readers may have noticed that this blog took a bit of a hiatus over the summer while the authors spent some time away from work, and then working to catch up from the time away. Now that summer is winding down, the kids are heading back to school and life is starting to return
Hospitality industry employers take note: If you claim a “tip credit” toward the minimum wage for any of your employees, you need to make sure that all tips are properly distributed to employees. A recent case from the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals involving a Texas restaurant chain illustrates the hazards of making a mistake with the tip credit rules. 
Since the U.S. DOL published its 
One of the issues that colleges and universities are struggling with under the new FLSA overtime exemption rules is how to compensate residence hall directors. While responsibilities vary from institution to institution, residence hall directors generally are responsible for overseeing students living in a college or university residence hall. Their duties may include counseling students, applying and enforcing rules of conduct, coordinating and scheduling other workers, supervising student RAs, and similar responsibilities relating to the residence hall and its student residents. These positions can meet the “duties” test for exempt status under the administrative exemption, provided that they exercise the required level of discretion and independent judgment in the course of their duties. In some cases they might also qualify for an executive exemption if they supervise at least 2 or more other full-time employees (or more part-time employees whose hours are equivalent to two full-time workers). Residence hall director salaries usually are not large, in part because part of their compensation is typically provided in the form of free room and board. Residence hall directors are often required to live in their assigned residence hall. They often have extensive “on call” hours during which they are expected to be in or near their assigned residence hall, available to respond to any issues that may arise.![iStock_000009138140XSmall[1].jpg](https://www.wagehourinsights.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/849/2011/06/iStock_000009138140XSmall1-300x300.jpg)
One of the more surprising changes in the 
In a recent 