You may have heard about new overtime rules from the Department of Labor. It’s not all about bathroom laws. Michael Kelsheimer, author of the Employer Handbook, broke down the new rules in Federal Changes to Overtime Exemptions Alert.

In a gross over-simplification, employees that oversee others, i.e, manager, were exempt from overtime if they earned more than $23,660 year. Come December 1, that amount is increased to $47,476 per year.

So that means anyone earning less than that can no longer be exempt no matter how many employees they oversee and will be entitled to overtime pay if they work more than 40 hours per week.

Does your account lead that oversees a team make less than that? Do they work more than 40 hours per week? What about the lead developer?  Or customer service team leader?

We know many of you use independent contractors as opposed to employees and these rules would not apply if the person is truly an independent contractor.  But, classifying someone as an independent contractor is harder than you think.  Luckily, Michael has written about that, too in Are you an Employee or an Independent Contractor?