Employment FAQ

Information on overtime eligible employee exception time reporting can be found in HR Related Policies & Procedures (HRPPs), FSU-HRPP 2014:03, Overtime and Compensatory Time for Non-Exempt Employees.

The Vice President of each division worked with Deans, Directors, and Human Resources to review job duties.  The job duties were reviewed against the federal exemption tests under the Fair Labor Standards Act for final exemption status (exempt or non-exempt/overtime eligible). This review included a review of the duties performed by the position as well as the salary test.

We try to avoid mistakes, but it’s still possible that they will occur.  If you believe that your paycheck is inaccurate for any reason, whether due to a failure to properly pay for all hours worked, improper deductions may have been made, or otherwise, you must let us know by the end of the following pay period.  Do so by informing the payroll office in writing (including email) stating the pay period at issue and describing the mistake you believe was made.  Your concern will then be promptly reviewed and, if a mistake was made, it will be promptly corrected.  If you raise a concern and believe that it was not promptly and appropriate handled by the end of the following pay period, then forward your concern, in writing, to the Associate Vice President for Human Resources.  No one will be retaliated against for bringing errors to our attention; we want all employees to be properly paid.

Yes. Time Worked=Time Paid. However, this constitutes overtime and must be pre-approved. Overtime eligible employees need to modify their practices relating to checking emails, voicemail messages, and texts after hours and develop a habit of responding the next morning rather than responding that evening after hours. Managers and employees will need to recognize and support these practices. Consider disabling email notifications from your phone, so you are not compelled to check messages outside of work.

Vacation and sick time accrual will remain the same.

Work schedules must be managed within the weekly schedule of 40 hours at a time. For example, an employee cannot work 48 hours in week one and then 32 hours in week two.  In this example, week one should be paid at 40 hours regular and 8 hours of overtime, week two will be paid 32 regular hours.

Please refer to the Overtime and Compensatory Time policy.

Compensatory (Comp) time is an alternative way of recognizing overtime work in lieu of overtime pay for all hours worked per week in excess of 40 hours. Comp time is recorded at time and a half the number of overtime hours. Comp time may be accumulated and used by an employee without having to use vacation time.

You will be at 1½ times your regular rate of pay for all hours actually worked over 40 during a workweek.  Your regular rate will be determined by dividing your weekly salary (as well as any other compensation earned during that workweek) by 40, and you will be paid 1½ times that rate for your overtime hours worked.

Any travel during the course of a normal workday, from one worksite to another, counts as work time.  Thus, if you are working in the office and need to travel to a meeting or event 30 minutes away at 11 a.m., then that travel time is work time.  In other words, and in most instances, once your workday starts, travel occurring during the course of that workday (until you’re traveling back home at the end of the day) counts as work time.

We know that occasionally you may need to work more than 40 hours to complete assignments so sometimes overtime may be unavoidable, but we also believe that it should be the exception rather than the rule.  As mentioned above, employees may be able to flex their time over the course of the week, and so it should be possible for employees to not exceed 40 hours if they manage their workloads and schedules appropriately.  If for some reason more than 40 hours is needed, it is important that you give your supervisor as much advance notice as possible and obtain approval for the overtime.  In those instances, the supervisor may reassign some work or modify deadlines so that working more than 40 hours can be avoided.  Employees who fail to give their supervisors prior notice and seek permission to work overtime, and who still work overtime, may be subject to discipline.

Basically, any time that you are actively engaged in work for the University counts as reportable work time. That includes actual “work at the desk”, but it also includes breaks of less than 20 minutes, working during meal periods, attending business related meetings or calls, doing research related to work, reading and answering emails related to work, and in some circumstances, work related travel.

Importantly, not all time during a work day is “work time”, and those hours are not to be included in your daily record of time worked. This non-compensable time includes breaks of more than 20 minutes, duty free meal periods of more than 30 minutes, the normal commute between your home and your worksite, and some work related travel.

Under the law, we have to have a record of how many hours each overtime eligible employee works per day and per week. There are various ways to gather this information without employees punching a clock, and given the type of work we do, we believe that punching a clock may be burdensome. That said, we still need this information.

Toward this end, each overtime eligible employee will be responsible for tracking their own hours and completing a time sheet. The time sheets are to reflect all hours and over time the employee works per day and week, as follows.

• First, our normal workweek is 40 hours of work, exclusive of meal periods of at least 30 minutes.
• Second, employees will have to track their own time worked per day and record that time on their timesheets. Employees will also record their time off for personal, sick, vacation or holiday reasons, even for partial days. The timesheets will have columns for these various entries.
• Third, under this arrangement, it is possible for the number of hours worked to vary from day to day. For instance, during a workweek, an employee may work 10 hours on Day 1 due to a deadline. In this instance, it is possible for the employee to work less on some other day to avoid exceeding 40 hours for the workweek. This type of flexible scheduling is encouraged, but it requires the prior approval of a supervisor.
• Fourth, it is possible for an employee to also actually work more than 40 hours during a workweek. Should an overtime eligible employee believe that his or her workweek may exceed 40 hours, the employee should promptly let his or her supervisor know ahead of time and obtain approval for the hours worked over 40. This would occur in the example described above. It is our goal to minimize incurring overtime work, but we realize that sometimes that will be unavoidable. It is therefore important that supervisors be contacted as the potential for working more than 40 hours materializes so that other options may be considered.

We expect time to be accurately recorded and that employees not overstate or understate time worked. Overtime eligible employees are asked to record time actually worked.

No.  While making this conversion from overtime exempt to overtime eligible, we are retaining employees as salaried and overtime eligible at their same base pay paid before the conversion.  As explained above, the base salary is intended to cover all hours worked during a workweek up to 40 hours, with overtime pay to become due if the employee actually works over 40 hours during that workweek.

The employees who are being converted to be overtime eligible due to the regulatory change will continue to be paid a salary, but their salaries will only cover up to the first 40 hours of actual work during the workweek.

Overtime eligible employees are entitled to receive overtime premiums whenever they actually work over 40 hours during a workweek.  Compensable work time includes time during which work is performed, including breaks of less than 20 minutes.  Longer breaks and meal periods of more than 30 minutes do not count as work time, nor does time spent while on a paid or unpaid day off for any reason.

Not at all.  It is not a reflection on your job or your performance, professionalism or value to the organization.  It is purely a reclassification needed to comply with the change in the applicable federal regulations.

We don’t anticipate any major changes to your core duties and responsibilities as a result of this change, but it is possible that some change in work mix may result so that we can manage the amount of overtime worked by employees.

No. Under federal law, an employee cannot waive his or her right to overtime compensation. These changes are being made to comply with the new federal regulations. We have no option but to reclassify employees as overtime eligible if their position does not meet the new criteria for exempt status under the new regulations, which has two parts to it: 1) the duties test and 2) the salary test.

Internal postings are positions that are only available to currently employed Ferris State University employees. When a posting is internal, only current employees can view, apply for, or be selected for the position. External candidates are not considered for the available position at this point in the process.

Positions that are only available to currently employed Ferris State University employees can be viewed by logging into Ferris360, searching for "Internal Job Postings" and clicking the search result.

Applicants requiring an accommodation or additional assistance in the application process should contact the Office of Human Resources at 231-591-2150 or email [email protected].

Use our Electronic Employment System