Pop quiz! What’s your FLSA-acumen?

Salaried or exempt? On the clock or off? How well-versed are you on the ins and outs of the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA)? Take this quiz to find out.

Of course you have a good sense of what makes someone a salaried exempt employee and when someone should be entitled to time and a half.

But what about some of the more obscure parts of the federal law that governs those decisions?

We’ve dug a little deeper to create this FLSA quiz. You can pass it along to your finance staffers or perhaps even test your own knowledge.

1. If an employee wins an FLSA complaint against its employer, how far back do the back pay damages reach?

a)      From the time the complaint was filed

b)      A year before the complaint was filed

c)       2 years from when the complaint was filed

d)      5 years from when the complaint was filed.

Answer: c. If your company is found to have violated the FLSA, you will owe that individual back pay for all owed overtime for a window of two years before the complaint was filed.

2. Which of the following may impact when your company might not have to pay overtime at a rate of time and a half?

a)      Shift differentials

b)      Longevity pay

c)       Non-discretionary wage augments

d)      All of the above?

Answer: d. Any of these factors may change the rate of overtime pay your company owes a given employee. However, certain arrangements may allow your company to pay for some work at a different rate, but only if the work is different from the employee’s regular job, and only if that’s been agreed upon before the work’s performed.

3. An employee takes the train to and from work each day. Is that time compensable?

Answer: Not generally – commuting time is usually not compensable time and wouldn’t be included towards overtime calculations. That is, unless the employee is working during his or her train ride:  answering e-mails, making phone calls, etc. Seeing as that is more and more common these days, it’s an area companies have to be especially careful of.

4. True or false:  Any money recovered by an employee in a FLSA case is taxable.

Answer: True. Payroll will have to get even more involved in any overtime disputes your company loses  — that money is taxable.

5. Can you pay an employee overtime in time instead of money?

Answer: Not if you’re a private employer. Public companies can pay overtime in time under certain circumstances. But they have to do it at a rate of time and a half, and employees have the option to cash that time out when they leave your company.