Source: http://truckersunited.org/ata-establishing-federal-labor-law-specific-drivers/
Timestamp: 2017-11-18 13:59:08
Document Index: 293945456

Matched Legal Cases: ['art 395', 'art 395', 'art 395', '§ 785', '§ 785', '§785', '§ 785']

Posted by Patrick Hockaday | May 24, 2017 | Uncategorized | 0 |
Part A of the Denham Method is still being pursued by the ATA thereby establishing a Federal Labor Law specific to Drivers operating under part 395.
Ca. Labor Law requires Rest and Meal Breaks for Drivers no different than most all other employees are granted.
What is not spoken of by the ATA is the fact that Ca. Labor Law requires Detention Time Be Paid to Employee Drivers.
F4A Preemption will establish Piece Work wages as the standard and will eliminate the requirement that Detention Time be compensated.
A State, political subdivision of a State, or political authority of 2 or more States may not enact or enforce a law, regulation, or other provision having the force and effect of law prohibiting employees whose hours of service are subject to regulation by the Secretary under section 31502 from working to the full extent permitted or at such times as permitted under such section, or imposing any additional obligations on motor carriers if such employees work to the full extent or at such times as permitted under such section, including any related activities regulated under part 395 of title 49, 7 Code of Federal Regulations.
Section 31502 deals specifically with interstate Drivers.
“imposing any additional obligations on motor carriers” would cover any pay beyond piece work pay such as Detention Time Pay.
“including any related activities regulated under part 395 of title 49, 7 Code of Federal Regulations” would cover duties preformed and logged as “On Duty Not Driving”.
Concerning Detention Time.
To fully understand the implications of Federal Labor Law and how it is NOT being applied to Employee OTR Drivers I would suggest that you read § 785.7 through § 785.41.
It is obvious to me that the ATA is using the Federal Motor Carriers Safety Regulations as guidelines to determine when and for what the Employee OTR Driver is paid.
The piece work method used establishes the minimum baseline milage rate at .145cpm. At $7.25 an hour divided by 50mph = .145cpm.
Subsequently, the Court ruled that there need be no exertion at all and that all hours are hours worked which the employee is required to give his employer, that “an employer, if he chooses, may hire a man to do nothing, or to do nothing but wait for something to happen.
The Portal-to-Portal Act did not change the rule except to provide an exception for preliminary and postliminary activities. See §785.34.
Read § 785.14 General and consider how Line 1 “Off Duty” actually contradicts itself. “Engaged to Wait” and “Waiting to Be Engaged” are both covered under this heading.
The courts seem to only see “Off Duty” and take that as meaning “Waiting to Be Engaged” when in fact the Employee is actually “Engaged to Wait” as they are waiting to load or offload, job duties that must be preformed before the next job duty may be undertaken as they are ” controlled or required by the employer and pursued necessarily and primarily for the benefit of the employer and his business”.
Ca. Labor Code 226.2. (Partial)
http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/selectFromMultiples.xhtml?lawCode=LAB&sectionNum=226.2.
This section shall apply for employees who are compensated on a piece-rate basis for any work performed during a pay period.
This section shall not be construed to limit or alter minimum wage or overtime compensation requirements, or the obligation to compensate employees for all hours worked under any other statute or local ordinance.
For the purposes of this section, “applicable minimum wage” means the highest of the federal, state, or local minimum wage that is applicable to the employment, and “other nonproductive time” means time under the employer’s control, exclusive of rest and recovery periods, that is not directly related to the activity being compensated on a piece-rate basis.
• Employees must be compensated for other nonproductive time separate from any piece-rate compensation, and
• Employees must be compensated for other nonproductive time “at an hourly rate that is no less than the applicable minimum wage.
Concerning Ca. Meal and Rest Breaks.
The ATA and others have spun Ca. Rest Break rules as meaning the Employee Driver will be required to take the rest breaks thereby losing production time as it could take 15min to find and park the truck in order to take the 10min break and another 15min lost production time to get back on the road.
Piece workers are being paid whenever they are producing pieces.
The hourly employee is paid for not working during a 10min break.
For this reason, the piece worker is required to be paid hourly and separately for their earned 10 min breaks. In other words, they are to be paid 10min in addition to their piece work wage in order to have the same benefit as the hourly worker for being paid 10min for not working.
If asked, the employee may voluntarily work through the break but must be compensated for doing so.
A piece worker is being paid if they work through their break.
The law states that the rest breaks must be “made available” to the employee. It does not say the employee has to take the break.
Law suits in Ca. stem around carriers denying Employee Drivers their breaks. Ca. Labor Code requires that an employee who is denied their break be paid 1 hour “Premium Time”. This applies to denied meal breaks as well.
There is a limit of two “Premium Time” payments per working shift.
What has actually happened is, interstate carriers have told their employees to keep working, they denied the employees their meal and rest breaks. The carriers then failed to pay the Employee Drivers the required 1 hour “Premium Time” for the denied breaks.
The carriers assumed that they were exempt from the states laws because they were involved in interstate commerce.
We must remember that it is the States Rights to impose stricter regulations than the Federal regulations as is common when it comes to haz-mat handling and routing or establishing minimum wage requirements.
In Dilts vs Penske as heard in the 9th District Court, Penske’s attorneys argued that the 1994 FAAAA Bill took away the States Rights to Regulate trucking and that Ca’s. Labor Laws affected Rates, Routes and Services.
The ATA had tried to alter Ca. Labor law on 4 separate occasions since 2000 using the FAAAA argument without success.
If an employer has authorized and permitted two 10-minute rest periods during an employee’s work shift, the “compensable” rest and recovery periods are those that have been authorized and permitted according to existing law.
That is the amount of time for which an employee must be compensated (i.e., the “compensable” period), and which must be itemized on the wage statement, regardless of whether the employee actually took only 8 minutes on one rest period (less than the amount of time that was “compensable”), or took 13 minutes on another rest period (more than the amount of time that was “compensable”).
The ATA wants Drivers to believe that F4A Preemption will prevent lost production time, lost income.
Ca. Labor Law is good for Drivers and it should be used as model for other states to follow.
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