How to Classify Employees under the FLSA (Exempt vs. Non-exempt)

HR Question: We have a few employees on salary who work well over 40 hours a week, and we have never paid them overtime. Someone recently told me that paying a salary isn't enough to make someone exempt. How do we know whether we have classified our employees correctly, and what happens if we got it wrong?

HR Answer: This is one of the most common questions we receive, and for good reason. Exempt and non-exempt classification is easy to get wrong, the consequences of getting it wrong are expensive and the rules have shifted more than once in the past two years. The good news is that the framework itself is stable and knowable. Most misclassifications that we encounter isn't the result of bad intent. It comes from assumptions that sound reasonable but don’t match what the law requires.

Let’s start with the most persistent myth.

Please select this link to read the complete article from OSAP Member Clark Schaefer Hackett Strategic HR.