Travel time: what employers must pay for
Ordinary home-to-work travel is not hours worked. Everything the employer adds on top of the ordinary commute usually is. The FLSA test is not the length of the journey but whether the travel is part of the employer's business.
Compensable travel
- Travel between two work sites inside the same day, such as from the depot to a client and back.
- Travel from the office to a distant city on a special one-day assignment, counted from the start of the journey, which is why an early start at a train station counts.
- Any travel during the working day as a passenger, in a company vehicle or not.
- Travel by common carrier, such as a train or plane, for an overnight trip, counted as hours worked except for meal periods and sleep time up to eight hours when the trip runs overnight.
Not compensable
- The home-to-work commute, however long, in a vehicle or not.
- Travel from the hotel to a client site at the destination of an overnight trip, once the employee is in the destination city.
- Time off duty as a passenger on a night trip if the sleeping conditions are adequate and there is an agreement in advance.
- Optional extra travel that the employer did not require.
The two edges that catch people
First, a company-provided vehicle does not make the commute compensable by itself. Second, the special one-day assignment rule only reaches out-of-town trips; driving an hour across your own metro each morning is still a commute and is unpaid.
Travel that crosses 40 hours
Compensable travel counts toward the 40, so a week with two long site visits can land in overtime. Employers on a variable-expense basis often try to pay a flat travel allowance instead, but a flat amount that falls short of the hours at the regular rate leaves a shortfall on the rest of the pay for that week.