• Workers employed by a motor carrier or those involved in the safe operation of motor vehicles can receive an overtime exemption.
• Overtime provisions affect motor carrier employees who meet the criteria for a small vehicle exception.

The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) provides an overtime exemption for employees who are within the authority of the Secretary of Transportation to establish qualifications and maximum hours of service under the Motor Carrier Act, except employees covered by the small vehicle exception described in this section. The overtime exemption could apply to employees who are:

1. Employed by a motor carrier or motor private carrier;
2. Drivers, drivers’ helpers, loaders, or mechanics whose duties affect the safe operation of motor vehicles in transportation on public highways in interstate or foreign commerce; and
3. Not covered by the small vehicle exception.

Motor carriers are entities providing motor vehicle transportation for compensation. Motor private carriers are entities other than motor carriers transporting property by motor vehicle if the entity is the owner, lessee, or bailee of the property being transported, and the property is being transported for sale, lease, rent, or bailment, or to further a commercial enterprise.

The regulations in 29 CFR Part 782, Exemption from Maximum Hours Provisions for Certain Employees of Motor Carriers, contain the specific requirements summarized in the following sections.

Employee duties

The employee’s duties must include performance, either regularly or from time to time, of “safety-affecting activities” on a motor vehicle used in transportation on public highways in interstate or foreign commerce.

Employees performing such duties meet the duties requirement of the exemption regardless of the proportion of safety-affecting activities performed, except where continuing duties have no substantial direct effect on “safety of operation,” or where such safety-affecting activities are so trivial, casual, and insignificant as to be de minimis (as long as there is no change in the duties).

Transportation involved in the employee’s duties must be in interstate commerce (across state or international lines) or connect with an intrastate terminal (rail, air, water, or land) to continue an interstate journey of goods that have not come to rest at a final destination.

Safety-affecting employees who have not made an actual interstate trip may still meet the duties requirement of the exemption if:

• The employer is shown to have an involvement in interstate commerce; and
• The employee could, in the regular course of employment, reasonably have been expected to make an interstate journey or could have worked on the motor vehicle in such a way as to be safety-affecting.

The Secretary of Transportation will assert jurisdiction over employees for a four-month period beginning with the date they could have been called upon to, or actually did, engage in the carrier’s interstate activities. Thus, employees would satisfy the duties requirement of the exemption for the same four-month period.

The overtime exemption does not apply to employees not engaged in “safety-affecting activities” such as dispatchers, office personnel, those who unload vehicles, or those who load but are not responsible for proper loading of a vehicle. Only drivers, drivers’ helpers, loaders responsible for proper loading, and mechanics working directly on motor vehicles for use in transportation of passengers or property in interstate commerce can be exempt from overtime provisions.

The exemption does not apply to employees of non-carriers such as commercial garages, firms engaged in maintaining and repairing motor vehicles owned and operated by carriers, or firms engaged in leasing and renting motor vehicles to carriers.

Small vehicle exception

Despite the possible application of the exemption, overtime provisions will apply to an employee of a motor carrier or motor private carrier in any workweek that meets the following criteria:

1. The employee’s work, in whole or in part, is that of a driver, driver’s helper, loader, or mechanic affecting the safe operation of motor vehicles weighing 10,000 pounds or less in transportation on public highways in interstate or foreign commerce, except vehicles: (a) designed or used to transport more than eight passengers, including the driver, for compensation; or (b) designed or used to transport more than 15 passengers, including the driver, and not used to transport passengers for compensation; or (c) used in transporting hazardous material, requiring placarding under regulations prescribed by the Secretary of Transportation.
2. The employee performs duties on motor vehicles weighing 10,000 pounds or less.

The exemption does not apply to an employee in such workweeks even if the employee’s duties also affect the safe operation of motor vehicles weighing greater than 10,000 pounds, or other vehicles listed in the (a), (b), and (c) criteria, in the same workweek.