Service company needing help

[PamperedPetSit]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? Massachusetts

Hi. I'm new to this forum, so thank you in advance for any help or insight.

I own a Professional pet sitting company. I have 9 employees. I am here to be sure that I am paying them correctly and to ask advice about the "fringe benefits".

First, I pay by the hour, but do not pay drive time. We go to an from clients homes (in our own vehicles), doing either a half hour sit or hour sit. I add up all the sits and form an hourly wage. Question number one is if that is the correct way of doing it?

Second: Last year, to help my employees and to offer an incentive, I created the "mileage reimbursement program", in which I paid 10 cents a mile. Employees signed the waiver that explained that this program could be rescinded at any time. Last week, I decided to discontinue the program. Needless to say, there has been some fall out. One employee in particular is now demanding that I pay her travel time AND administrative pay (for emailing me changes to schedule from clients, etc).

Today I am working on an actual job description, and will ask all employees to sign it.

But I am wondering, am I supposed to have to pay for travel time?

I should also mention that my sitters get between $11.50 and $15.00 per hour, so I believe that even with drive time, I am over the minimum wage for the amount of work they do per hour.

Any help would be appreciated.

Candy

 

[swalsh411]

The U.S. Department of Labor says travel time spent by employees as part of their principal activity, such as travel among job sites during the workday, is considered “work time” and must be paid. Commuting between an employee's home and work location or central office is not work time.

I am not aware of any requirement for employers to reimburse employees for mileage. They can claim it as a deduction on their personal taxes though in some cases.

 

[PamperedPetSit]

Thank you, I will look into that. I am wondering how I am to keep track of their work day though?

Say a sitter leaves her house and goes to a sit, would the "pay" begin at that first sit? Another example, what if a client has two sits in the morning, goes home for a few hours, then has a sit at night? It sounds so complicated to keep track of.

Candy

 

[pattytx]

Drive time from their home to the first "sit" and from their last "sit" home is commute time and needn't be paid. Neither would from home to a "sit", then home, then out to another "sit", then home. However, drive time between sits is compensable under the FLSA.

http://www.dol.gov/dol/allcfr/ESA/Title_29/Part_785/29CFR785.35.htm
http://www.dol.gov/dol/allcfr/ESA/Title_29/Part_785/29CFR785.36.htm

The bigger elephant in the room, however, is whether you are even subject to the FLSA at all, but it's most likely you (or better said, the employees) are.
http://www.dol.gov/whd/regs/compliance/whdfs14.pdf

BTW, as long as you let the employees know of the rate before they "work" the time, you could pay them as little as minimum wage for the drive time between clients. Relative to the "time", since they're basically on their own, you kind of have to trust them. You can certainly question drive times that seem unreasonable.

What a cool business!