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My company recently changed their overtime policy. They used to pay for any overtime earned in a monthly period, and then pay that out at the end of the following month. They have just changed this to paying employees for overtime worked in a quarter, thus making it more difficult for employees to get paid for overtime. My company is a computer consulting firm and we only get paid overtime for "billable" hours. They claimed that they are doing this to get away from paying us regularly due to some new IRS regulations. They said this is the only way they can continue to pay us overtime. Most of us are salaried employees and we get the same base salary whether we are working on a project for a client (i.e. billable hours) or if we are in-between projects. We typically only get paid overtime pay if we "bill" more than 8 hours per day for a defined period (previously monthly, now it is quarterly).
So for example, I might work 50 hours a week in January and February on a client project, and then be "on the bench" in March (not working on a client project), and I wouldn't get paid any overtime pay since my billable hours fell below the total hours for the quarter. However, I'm still required to come into the office 8 hours per day, and I still get paid my base salary. But any additional hours I worked in January and February I would not get compensated for.
Again, my company has told us that they have to do this due to some new classification of computer professionals. They said if they continued to allow employees to accrue overtime and get paid for it monthly, they are at risk of fines by the government.
Does this make sense? Is what they are doing legal?
So for example, I might work 50 hours a week in January and February on a client project, and then be "on the bench" in March (not working on a client project), and I wouldn't get paid any overtime pay since my billable hours fell below the total hours for the quarter. However, I'm still required to come into the office 8 hours per day, and I still get paid my base salary. But any additional hours I worked in January and February I would not get compensated for.
Again, my company has told us that they have to do this due to some new classification of computer professionals. They said if they continued to allow employees to accrue overtime and get paid for it monthly, they are at risk of fines by the government.
Does this make sense? Is what they are doing legal?