DST (2018)

[jakeroot]

It probably depends on whether he's paid hourly or salary, and whether he's entitled to full time and a half overtime, just straight time overtime, or no overtime at all.  And if they're going to give him overtime for the long day, are they going to dock his pay for the short one?  Seems like the issue is messy no matter how you do it... if you ignore it, it's fair if the number of long and short days is even, but not if someone works a different number of each due to dates of their employment.  And if you factor it in, depending on how you do it, the company might have to eat that hour, or employees will arbitrarily have a smaller paycheck one pay period.

At least with salaried employees in my area, there's no such thing as overtime. You work the hours they expect you to, and you get a paycheck in return. Whether a week is short or long isn't typically relevant.

I suppose most of these issues are avoided by having the fall-back/spring-forward times on Sunday mornings, when virtually no one is working.

[slorydn1]

Workplaces that have workers on the overnight shift during fallback night in the fall may have some issues too.  If an employee usually works Saturday night at 10 PM until 6 AM Sunday it's usually 8 hours, but during fallback night it's 9 hours and they're entitled to overtime.

It's not really a problem. What we do at our agency is write down the 12 hours we usually work regardless. So if I work the spring one I'm only working 11 hours, but I'll make up for it in November by working 13, so over the course of the year it all balances out.

Back in the day we used to put down 11 and 13 but it was decided to just have us put down the same 12 either way. It saved the county a half hour of comp time and we don't get shorted because the other week is short by 1 hour.

Unless I missed something, OT is calculated for the work week, not over the course of an entire year. In the fall, an employee that normally works 40 hours works 41, and is entitled to overtime pay for that extra hour. Just because it's an hour made up that was previously lost in March doesn't mean he's not entitled to the OT pay. He still worked a longer-than-normal week.

There are a couple of twists I forgot to tell you about:

Our work week starts on Wednesday and ends on Tuesday. So week 1 of the pay period we work Wed and Thurs, off the weekend, work Mon and Tues. Week 2 we work Fri, Sat, and Sun. That's 48 hours week 1, 36 hours week 2. I get comp time, not cash overtime-unless I hit a certain number of hours of comp, I forgot how much, but I never get to that number because it gets burned off by taking lunches, going home early, taking days off, (etc). So week one I get 8 x 1.5 hrs (12 hrs) added to my account and week 2 I get 4 hours deducted from my account because we have to show at least 40 hrs each week.

Working the time shift weekend means 35 hours in the spring, 37 hours in the fall. What we used to have to do was put down 35 hrs worked week 2 (only 11 hrs for that Saturday night/Sunday morning) and burn 5 hrs of comp time to get it to the 40 hrs we get paid. In November we would have put 13 hrs down for that Saturday night/Sunday morning to equal 37 hours and burn only 3 hrs of comp. But now we don't have to, and it all comes out in the wash anyway (8 hrs burned over the course of the year, either way).


Note: I underline "we don't have to" because I could do so, if I chose, to go back to doing it that way-but I have a tendency to fill out my time sheets ahead of time unless I'm going on vacation or something like that where I need to do something different than my usual totaling up-its just easier for me.


Now, if I had some training or something that I had to come in for on one of those off days and that put me at or over 40 hours of work for that week, that might or might not change my thinking. I'm really not worried about it either way because my pay check is going to be the same, its just a floating number of hours on the side that ebbs and flows that I can use to not come to work and still get paid, and not use my vacation/sick/holiday time for.


Oh and vdeane, although it may sound like it because of the way I get paid, I technically am not salaried. My boss is, and his time sheet doesn't have a break down by day, just for the week. He has to certify that he worked at least 40 hrs or burn his vacation/sick/holiday time to get to that number for the week. He does not get comp time. My time sheet has a breakdown by each day worked during the week, but I don't "clock in". I just write down the number of hours worked each day and total it up from there.


Our system was really set up for the Monday through Friday 8a-5p (an hour off for lunch), no nights weekends, holidays or hurricanes the majority of the"non essential" employees work. Law enforcement, detention, and firefighters, though essential, are exempt from overtime the way most people understand overtime to work (there is a whole different way they get figured out where things like Kelly time gets factored in before they see a second of overtime that is so confusing I'm not even sure I get it). Those of us in 911 are considered "civilian" essential employees so we are governed under the rules of overtime most people think of but we do comp instead of cash. I don't know the total number of employees the county has, I am guessing well over 500 though, and there are only 13 of us who get regular overtime and are not exempt "Kelly" employees.


In any event, the last two years I did not work either of the "time shift" weekends so I haven't been affected either way.

[kkt]

Workplaces that have workers on the overnight shift during fallback night in the fall may have some issues too.  If an employee usually works Saturday night at 10 PM until 6 AM Sunday it's usually 8 hours, but during fallback night it's 9 hours and they're entitled to overtime.

It's not really a problem. What we do at our agency is write down the 12 hours we usually work regardless. So if I work the spring one I'm only working 11 hours, but I'll make up for it in November by working 13, so over the course of the year it all balances out.

Back in the day we used to put down 11 and 13 but it was decided to just have us put down the same 12 either way. It saved the county a half hour of comp time and we don't get shorted because the other week is short by 1 hour.

Unless I missed something, OT is calculated for the work week, not over the course of an entire year. In the fall, an employee that normally works 40 hours works 41, and is entitled to overtime pay for that extra hour. Just because it's an hour made up that was previously lost in March doesn't mean he's not entitled to the OT pay. He still worked a longer-than-normal week.

In my workplace, reporting hours that are not true for that day would be seen as fraud.

We don't always assign the same worker to overnight shifts.  It would be sheer luck if a spring-forward overnight shift worker also worked the fall-back shift.  And regardless, overtime and wages for hourly workers are based on the scheduled work week, not what might happen seven months later.

Maybe we should always assign salaried workers to the overnight shift

[kalvado]

Workplaces that have workers on the overnight shift during fallback night in the fall may have some issues too.  If an employee usually works Saturday night at 10 PM until 6 AM Sunday it's usually 8 hours, but during fallback night it's 9 hours and they're entitled to overtime.

It's not really a problem. What we do at our agency is write down the 12 hours we usually work regardless. So if I work the spring one I'm only working 11 hours, but I'll make up for it in November by working 13, so over the course of the year it all balances out.

Back in the day we used to put down 11 and 13 but it was decided to just have us put down the same 12 either way. It saved the county a half hour of comp time and we don't get shorted because the other week is short by 1 hour.

Unless I missed something, OT is calculated for the work week, not over the course of an entire year. In the fall, an employee that normally works 40 hours works 41, and is entitled to overtime pay for that extra hour. Just because it's an hour made up that was previously lost in March doesn't mean he's not entitled to the OT pay. He still worked a longer-than-normal week.

In my workplace, reporting hours that are not true for that day would be seen as fraud.

We don't always assign the same worker to overnight shifts.  It would be sheer luck if a spring-forward overnight shift worker also worked the fall-back shift.  And regardless, overtime and wages for hourly workers are based on the scheduled work week, not what might happen seven months later.

Maybe we should always assign salaried workers to the overnight shift

Whatever it worth, here is a quote from e-mail sent out by our HR:

when the clocks go forward one hour, and employees only work 11 hours instead of 12 hours on the overnight shift, they are only paid for the 11 hours or the time they actually worked.  Please consider allowing employees to use their accruals for the hour missed or allow them to stay an extra hour after their shift is scheduled to end to make up the hour. [...]must follow A-21 and A-133 regulations, we do not have the liberty to "give" time not worked.

As far as I understand, this refers to federal Office of Management and Budget (OMB) documents.

[jakeroot]

Workplaces that have workers on the overnight shift during fallback night in the fall may have some issues too.  If an employee usually works Saturday night at 10 PM until 6 AM Sunday it's usually 8 hours, but during fallback night it's 9 hours and they're entitled to overtime.

It's not really a problem. What we do at our agency is write down the 12 hours we usually work regardless. So if I work the spring one I'm only working 11 hours, but I'll make up for it in November by working 13, so over the course of the year it all balances out.

Back in the day we used to put down 11 and 13 but it was decided to just have us put down the same 12 either way. It saved the county a half hour of comp time and we don't get shorted because the other week is short by 1 hour.

Unless I missed something, OT is calculated for the work week, not over the course of an entire year. In the fall, an employee that normally works 40 hours works 41, and is entitled to overtime pay for that extra hour. Just because it's an hour made up that was previously lost in March doesn't mean he's not entitled to the OT pay. He still worked a longer-than-normal week.

There are a couple of twists I forgot to tell you about:
...
...

MUCH simpler where I work. Pay periods are 1st to 15th, 16th to end of month. OT is calculated on the current week, regardless if they pay period ends mid-week.

[Duke87]

Yep.  What the county is doing is illegal.

Against the letter of the law but not necessarily the spirit of it since it is, overall, a wash.

This is also one of those things that it can be illegal all it wants, that doesn't matter unless there is a desire to actually enforce the law in this case, which I'm guessing there is not. The limited resources of the state labor department have bigger fish to fry than going after employers for not accounting for DST in the officially sanctioned manner.

[Scott5114]

At least with salaried employees in my area, there's no such thing as overtime. You work the hours they expect you to, and you get a paycheck in return. Whether a week is short or long isn't typically relevant.

A distinction that is important to make: Most salaried employees are also classified as "FLSA exempt", which is the real reason they get no overtime; it has nothing to do with salary/hourly pay setup. To qualify as FLSA exempt, an employee must meet at least one of several criteria, the long list of which isn't terribly relevant to most people. Most exempt employees are classified as such by meeting the criteria for being a professional, administrative, or executive employee. That is, management or white-collar workers. You can't give a cashier a salary and then not pay them overtime–they still qualify for it under FLSA despite the salary. (All you did is make the math way more complicated because now you have to figure out how to pay time-and-a-half on a salary.)

This is also one of those things that it can be illegal all it wants, that doesn't matter unless there is a desire to actually enforce the law in this case, which I'm guessing there is not. The limited resources of the state labor department have bigger fish to fry than going after employers for not accounting for DST in the officially sanctioned manner.

Not necessarily–in labor disputes it's often an issue of squeaky wheels getting the grease. Most abuses are allowed to stand not because of a lack of resources by the enforcement agencies, but ignorance on the affected employees' part that laws are being broken in the first place, or reluctance to confront the employer in fear of retaliation. Wage-and-hour violations are usually pretty clear cut–you either paid someone correctly or you didn't–so it's a fairly attractive target for a state agency to swoop in and assess a fine. They have to know about it first, though.

[jeffandnicole]

On the NJ Turnpike, it turned out they are more lenient than most based on what I've read thru the years, including in this thread.  For those affected, in the Spring they still get their full 8 hour shift pay, even though they only worked 7 hours.  In the fall, they get 9 hours pay, since they worked an additional 1 when the clocks fell back.  If this pushed anyone into OT status (or if they already were in the OT status), then they get OT.  Since most full timers work during the week and only part timers were working the weekend, this didn't generally come into play.

Yep.  What the county is doing is illegal.

Against the letter of the law but not necessarily the spirit of it since it is, overall, a wash.

No...it's againt the letter.  If it was in spirit, employers could start working employees 50 or 60 hours a week, only to cut them back to 20 or 30 hours the next week. Or...even worse, you could wind up working 20 hours one week, and the employer can say to make up for it you can work 60 hours the next week, and not get paid overtime.  There's also the need that the employer would need to stay employed and work the same shift 9 months later.   And then there's always the probability the employee was hired sometime between mid-March and October, who didn't get a free hour in the spring.

[tradephoric]

Here are sunrise/sunset times of various cities during the winter solstice under Standard Time and proposed year-round DST.  Those poor people in Bangor, Maine currently watch the sunset at 3:57PM during the winter solstice... depressing!

[jeffandnicole]

Here are sunrise/sunset times of various cities during the winter solstice under Standard Time and proposed year-round DST.  Those poor people in Bangor, Maine currently watch the sunset at 3:57PM during the winter solstice… depressing!

But look at that sunrise time in Detroit!  High school kids would be in their 2nd period classes before they see daylight!

[kalvado]

Here are sunrise/sunset times of various cities during the winter solstice under Standard Time and proposed year-round DST.  Those poor people in Bangor, Maine currently watch the sunset at 3:57PM during the winter solstice... depressing!

But look at that sunrise time in Detroit!  High school kids would be in their 2nd period classes before they see daylight!

resolving algorithm:
1. define criteria: latest sunrise time acceptable, earliest sunset time acceptable, etc..
2. determine sunrise and sunset times for different time zone settings
3. realize anything would make many people unhappy
4. Send B-52 with nukes to make problem non-existent
5. Proceed to a next location

[jeffandnicole]

resolving algorithm:
1 - Infinity: realize anything would make many people unhappy
Bonus: Send B-52 with nukes to make problem non-existent

Fixed. 

[kkt]

Here are sunrise/sunset times of various cities during the winter solstice under Standard Time and proposed year-round DST.  Those poor people in Bangor, Maine currently watch the sunset at 3:57PM during the winter solstice... depressing!

But look at that sunrise time in Detroit!  High school kids would be in their 2nd period classes before they see daylight!

Yes.  Sunrise times after 8:00 AM should be avoided, even if it means the evening commute is in darkness.

[kalvado]

Yes.  Sunrise times after 8:00 AM should be avoided, even if it means the evening commute is in darkness.

Now behold the issue:
minimal day length at my latitude is 9 hours. Two cities at approximately same latitude in same Eastern time zone are Grand Rapids MI at 85.6 W and Portland ME at 70.4 W, meaning that they have just more than an hour astronomic time difference between two.
If you say that Grand Rapids shouldn't get sunrise after 8 (actually it has 8.15, but that is almost good enough), Portland gets sunrise at 7 - and 9 hours later, at 4 PM, sun goes down. Portland is not very happy about that.
Did I mention robbing Peter to pay Paul? It was somewhat similar experience... 

[02 Park Ave]

Should wanting DST be considered a moral weakness?

Everyone should want the Sun directly overhead at Noon and then accept naturally resulting sunrise and sunset times.

Anyone who wants more sunlight in the evening should realize that they would be taking it away from the morning with DST not some how manufacturing more of it.

Let Noon be Noon!

[Scott5114]

If everyone woke up at 1pm like I do then their morning commute would never be in darkness!

[webny99]

If everyone woke up at 1pm like I do then their morning commute would never be in darkness!

Dang, I wish I had that schedule! 
But don't forget that evening commutes account for 50%, too. So you've got a 50% average, whereas my commutes (7:00-7:30 and 4:30-5:00) are closer to 80-85% done in the light, and 100% from April to September.

[kj3400]

If everyone woke up at 1pm like I do then their morning commute would never be in darkness!

Hear hear!
There's also the added bonus of almost no traffic on the road when you head home.
The only negative to this is that when you get off nothing's open.

[Scott5114]

If everyone woke up at 1pm like I do then their morning commute would never be in darkness!

Dang, I wish I had that schedule! 

Come join us in the casino industry then! Get off at 11pm, go to bed at 3am! Have Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday off!

If everyone woke up at 1pm like I do then their morning commute would never be in darkness!

Hear hear!
There's also the added bonus of almost no traffic on the road when you head home.
The only negative to this is that when you get off nothing's open.

You gradually learn what is open when you get off and tailor your business habits accordingly. Norman has a 24-hour grocery store (Crest) that isn't Walmart, which is fantastic. There are several fast-food restaurants that are either 24 hour or close at something like 1am. And, of course, the internet is always open.

The weird thing is on your days off, all of a sudden these places you were barely aware existed because they're never open actually are, and it's really disorienting having the extra options. (Wait, I can actually eat at Wendy's?)

[english si]

Those poor people in Bangor, Maine currently watch the sunset at 3:57PM during the winter solstice... depressing!

But look at that luxury 7:09am sunrise time. London sees an hour less daylight on the solstice - 4 minutes less in the evening, but 55 minutes less in the morning. The pre-4pm sunsets are grim, but the post-8am dawns are worse.

I'm currently enjoying the 6am sunlight (aided by the ground being white the last couple of days making everything brighter) and don't particular look forward to it not arriving until 7am next Sunday. However I'm also enjoying the 6pm sunlight and am looking forward to it being 7pm next Sunday. The balance just about tips in favour, for me, at that point - if I can have it light for only one 6-7 in the day, then evening takes it by a hair. But faced with a terrible choice of having light at either 8.30am or 4.30pm, am takes it by far, just as pm takes it when it is 4.30am or 8.30pm!

[kkt]

Should wanting DST be considered a moral weakness?

Everyone should want the Sun directly overhead at Noon and then accept naturally resulting sunrise and sunset times.

Anyone who wants more sunlight in the evening should realize that they would be taking it away from the morning with DST not some how manufacturing more of it.

Let Noon be Noon!

In my experience very people care about noon being when the sun is right overhead, but a lot care about there being at least a little light in the sky when they get up.

[Eth]

Should wanting DST be considered a moral weakness?

Everyone should want the Sun directly overhead at Noon and then accept naturally resulting sunrise and sunset times.

Anyone who wants more sunlight in the evening should realize that they would be taking it away from the morning with DST not some how manufacturing more of it.

Let Noon be Noon!

In my experience very people care about noon being when the sun is right overhead, but a lot care about there being at least a little light in the sky when they get up.

Yeah, I'd care more about solar noon and nominal noon matching if noon were actually close to the midpoint of my day. I tend to be awake most days from around 7 AM to 11 PM, meaning "midday" for me would be around 3 PM. Of course, if the sun were directly overhead then, it would always be very dark when I woke up. Today, under DST, the sun will be directly overhead here at about 1:45, which I think makes for a good compromise.

[abefroman329]

Workplaces that have workers on the overnight shift during fallback night in the fall may have some issues too.  If an employee usually works Saturday night at 10 PM until 6 AM Sunday it's usually 8 hours, but during fallback night it's 9 hours and they're entitled to overtime.

It's not really a problem. What we do at our agency is write down the 12 hours we usually work regardless. So if I work the spring one I'm only working 11 hours, but I'll make up for it in November by working 13, so over the course of the year it all balances out.

Back in the day we used to put down 11 and 13 but it was decided to just have us put down the same 12 either way. It saved the county a half hour of comp time and we don't get shorted because the other week is short by 1 hour.

Unless I missed something, OT is calculated for the work week, not over the course of an entire year. In the fall, an employee that normally works 40 hours works 41, and is entitled to overtime pay for that extra hour. Just because it's an hour made up that was previously lost in March doesn't mean he's not entitled to the OT pay. He still worked a longer-than-normal week.

Yep.  What the county is doing is illegal.

Not necessarily.  My wife works for a local municipality part-time and her straight time/overtime is calculated on an annual basis.  Since she doesn't get PTO, if she wants to take a week off, she can make up the hours during the rest of the month, or even in another month.

[jeffandnicole]

Workplaces that have workers on the overnight shift during fallback night in the fall may have some issues too.  If an employee usually works Saturday night at 10 PM until 6 AM Sunday it's usually 8 hours, but during fallback night it's 9 hours and they're entitled to overtime.

It's not really a problem. What we do at our agency is write down the 12 hours we usually work regardless. So if I work the spring one I'm only working 11 hours, but I'll make up for it in November by working 13, so over the course of the year it all balances out.

Back in the day we used to put down 11 and 13 but it was decided to just have us put down the same 12 either way. It saved the county a half hour of comp time and we don't get shorted because the other week is short by 1 hour.

Unless I missed something, OT is calculated for the work week, not over the course of an entire year. In the fall, an employee that normally works 40 hours works 41, and is entitled to overtime pay for that extra hour. Just because it's an hour made up that was previously lost in March doesn't mean he's not entitled to the OT pay. He still worked a longer-than-normal week.

Yep.  What the county is doing is illegal.

Not necessarily.  My wife works for a local municipality part-time and her straight time/overtime is calculated on an annual basis.  Since she doesn't get PTO, if she wants to take a week off, she can make up the hours during the rest of the month, or even in another month.

Their policy doesn't make it legal.

If someone is working more than 40 hours per week and works on a per-hour basis, they should be getting overtime.  Even if there's an agreement in place, it can still be afoul of regulations.  I would also think that this is a verbal agreement too, especially if it would put someone over 40 hours.

Now, that all said - does this happen? Sure.  A lot.  But there's a difference between what employee and employers agree to, and what is the law.  And it's certainly not unheard of for someone to file or participate in a lawsuit years later, claiming they worked more than 40 hours and weren't compensated for it. 

[kkt]

Laws vary from state to state.  I wouldn't make claims about any state I hadn't worked in.