Exemptions: Overtime & minimum wage - Kansas

Summary of differences between federal and state regulations

Section 13(a)(1) of the FLSA provides an exemption from both minimum wage and overtime pay for employees employed as bona fide executive, administrative, professional, and outside sales employees. Section 13(a)(1) and Section 13(a)(17) also exempt certain computer employees.

To qualify for exemption, employees generally must meet certain tests regarding their job duties and be paid on a salary basis at not less than $684 per week. Job titles do not determine exempt status. In order for an exemption to apply, an employee’s specific job duties and salary must meet all the requirements of the Department’s regulations.

These salary minimum does not apply to outside sales employees, teachers, and employees practicing law or medicine. Exempt computer employees may be paid at least $684 on a salary basis or on an hourly basis at a rate not less than $27.63 an hour.

Employees who are EMTs, police, fire and corrections officers will receive not less than one and one-half times their regular rate of pay after working in excess of 258 aggregate hours in a period of 28 consecutive days.

The following are exempted from overtime provisions: agricultural workers, domestics, those employed in an executive, administrative or professional position, and outside commissioned salespeople.

Kansas stipulates that executive, administrative, and professional employees spend no more than 20 percent of their time in duties that are not directly and closely related to exempt work (or 40 percent for executive and administrative employees in retail or service establishments).

Kansas does not reference (and may not recognize) the “highly compensated employee” exemption for those earning over $107,432 per year.

State

Contact

Kansas Department of Labor Office of Employment Standards
 

Regulations

Statutes Chapter 44.--Labor and Industries
Article 12.--Minimum Wage and Maximum Hours
§§44-1202, 44-1204

Administrative Regulation Agency 49
Article 30.—Minimum Wage and Maximum Hours
§49-30-1. Definitions.

(i) ‘‘Executive’’ means: (1) any individual who owns at least twenty (20) percent interest in the enterprise and is in sole charge of an independent establishment or a physically separated branch establishment; or (2) an individual employed in the capacity of an executive paid in excess of one hundred fifty-five dollars ($155) per week and who does not devote more than twenty (20) percent, (forty (40) percent in the case of employees in a retail or service establishment) of his or her hours of work in a workweek to employment activities which are included in the coverage of these regulations.

(j) ‘‘Administrative capacity’’ means an individual employed in an administrative position, public or otherwise, when performance is of office or nonmanual work directly related to office management policies, or general business operations when: (1) such individual supervises at least two (2) other employees; and (2) does not devote more than twenty (20) percent (forty (40) percent in case of employees in retail or service establishments), of his or her hours of work in a workweek to employment activities which are included in the coverage of these regulations; (3) performs functions in the administration of a school system, educational establishment or institution, where the work is directly related to academic instruction or training; (4) an individual who exercises discretion and independent judgment regularly and directly to assist a bona fide executive or administrative person as herein defined, and is subject to the same qualifying requirements.

(k) ‘‘Professional capacity’’ means an individual so employed which: (1) Requires advanced scientific knowledge and learning, customarily acquired by a prolonged course of specialized intellectual instruction and study, as distinguished from a general academic education. (2) Requires work of an original, creative nature, using invention, imagination, and talent of the employee. (3) Requires the individual to teach, tutor, instruct or lecture. (4) Requires consistent exercise of discretion and judgment and is of such character that the work product cannot be standardized in relation to a given period of time. (5) Does not devote more than twenty (20) percent of hours worked in a workweek to activities which are not an essential and necessary incident to the work and who is paid at least one hundred seventy dollars ($170) per week.

(l) ‘‘Outside commission paid salesman’’ means a salesperson who is customarily and regularly engaged away from his or her employer’s place(s) of business while making sales, obtaining orders, or contracts for services, merchandise, or facilities for which a consideration is paid by the customer, and who does not devote more than twenty (20) percent of his or her work hours in a workweek to employment activities covered by these regulations.

Federal

Contact

The Department of Labor is the federal agency that monitors hours worked.

Regulations

Regulations for exempt employees can be found in CFR 29 Part 541, Defining And Delimiting The Exemptions For Executive, Administrative, Professional, Computer And Outside Sales Employees