Working 9 mos., paying over 12 mos.

Paige

We operate a food service business and will expand our business to include a unit that will only work 9 months out of the year and be closed for 3 months. We will hire one individual for the unit and she would like to be paid over 12 mos.--similar to how some teachers are paid.

How can we go about doing that? Would we have to set up an employment contract? We currently don't use employment agreements due to the liability they can bring on in legal battles. But how else could we set this up?

Thanks for any insight.

deniseE

I guess it will depend on how your payroll is set up...if she is salaried, it will be easier...take her yearly salary and stretch it across the full 12 months...it will result in a smaller paycheck...

or if you don't want to do it...you can tell her that it's her responsibility to set aside the "excess" from her check and place it in her own account.

I don't believe you're under any obligation to pay an ee differently than the other ee's just because they requested it.

pork1

PAIGE: I would suggest you call your friendly local Wage and Hour Division of either the State or the Feds. I have always found them to be helpful and friendly in answering these type of inquires. I could not find anything in my copy of the FLSA. It will, I believe, come down to whether the position is EXEMPT or NON-EXEMPT under FLSA.

You could also do a google, but the phone call would be the fastest.

PORK

Paige

Sorry--I should indicate that it would be a non-exempt position. They would like to make it a salaried position, but I just don't know that we could do that. This person would be working as a cook and would not be directly supervising anybody.

marc

If non-exempt, I don't see how you could stretch the pay over 9 months. There may be way, it just does not seem to fit with the requirements to pay for hours worked as you go.

POPEYE

Denise gave you the only viable solution, have her set up a savings account and if your set up to, do a payroll deduction to that account each payday. She would then have that available during the 3 months you are not in service.

LarryC

Paige, armed with advice already given, merely tell the employee that the law will not allow granting her wish to have her pay be "stretched out".

Crout

And by the way, the cook will be able to collect Unemployment for those three months.