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Page Number: 7.0

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PEREZ v. MORTGAGE BANKERS ASSN. 

Opinion of the Court 

exemption  for  such  employees  is  known  as  the  “adminis-
trative” exemption. 

The  FLSA  grants  the  Secretary  of  Labor  authority  to
“defin[e]”  and  “delimi[t]”  the  categories  of  exempt  admin- 
istrative  employees.  Ibid.  The  Secretary’s  current  regu- 
lations  regarding  the  administrative  exemption  were 
promulgated  in  2004  through  a  notice-and-comment 
rulemaking.  As  relevant  here,  the  2004  regulations  dif-
fered from the previous regulations in that they contained
a  new  section  providing  several  examples  of  exempt  ad-
ministrative employees.  See 29 CFR §541.203.  One of the 
examples  is  “[e]mployees  in  the  financial  services  indus-
try,”  who,  depending  on  the  nature  of  their  day-to-day 
work,  “generally  meet  the  duties  requirements  for  the
administrative  exception.” 
§541.203(b).    The  financial 
services  example  ends  with  a  caveat,  noting  that  “an
employee whose primary duty is selling financial products
does not qualify for the administrative exemption.”  Ibid. 

In 1999 and again in 2001, the Department’s Wage and 
Hour  Division  issued  letters  opining  that  mortgage-loan 
officers  do  not  qualify  for  the  administrative  exemption.
See  Opinion  Letter,  Loan  Officers/Exempt  Status,  6A
LRR,  Wages  and  Hours  Manual  99:8351  (Feb.  16,  2001);
Opinion  Letter,  Mortgage  Loan  Officers/Exempt  Status, 
id.,  at  99:8249.  (May  17,  1999).  In  other  words,  the  De-
partment  concluded  that  the  FLSA’s  minimum  wage  and 
maximum  hour  requirements  applied  to  mortgage-loan
officers.  When  the  Department  promulgated  its  current
FLSA  regulations  in  2004,  respondent  Mortgage  Bankers 
Association (MBA), a national trade association represent-
ing real estate finance companies, requested a new opinion 
In  2006,  the  De-
interpreting  the  revised  regulations. 
partment  issued  an  opinion  letter  finding  that  mortgage-
loan  officers  fell  within  the  administrative  exemption
under  the  2004  regulations.  See App.  to  Pet.  for  Cert.  in 
No. 13–1041, pp. 70a–84a.  Four years later, however, the