Help Wanted: Health aide pay after 10 hour-day

The following question is a follow-up to last month's column question about home-health aides.

But here's a wrinkle that could work in your favor. If the employees' daily wages are greater than 10-plus hours at minimum wage, which is $7.25 an hour, plus that extra hour at $7.25, you don't have to pay the extra hour. It's considered covered.

And you correctly note what the column said two weeks ago: When the duties of home-health aides consist primarily of housekeeping, they are eligible for overtime when they work more than 40 hours a week. But when their duties consist mainly of companionship, they don't have to earn overtime.

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"In order to qualify for a professional exemption, a person would need an advanced degree, or at least a four-year degree," said Irv Miljoner, who heads the U.S. Labor Department's Long Island office.

Here is what a Labor Department fact sheet says more specifically about the educational requirements for the professional exemption:

"The advanced knowledge must be in a field of science or learning, and the advanced knowledge must be customarily acquired by a prolonged course of specialized intellectual instruction."

Education and overtime eligibility also come into play regarding registered nurses and licensed practical nurses. RNs are generally exempt from overtime because they obtain four-year degrees. By contrast, LPNs are eligible for overtime, or are nonexempt, because they often have two-year degrees.

Of course, other factors come into play in determining whether employees are exempt from overtime on a professional basis, such as their primary duties and their weekly pay. But education is an important starting point in the determination. For more questions, call the U.S. Labor Department at 516-338-1890.

For more on the "spread of hours" state rule go to http://bit.ly/1dQzZHw

For more on the professional exemption and overtime go to http://1.usa.gov/12ZBWjs