Do You Get Paid for Travel Time and Training? What Federal Rules Count as Work
Do you get paid for travel time and training?
Unpaid hours shrink your real hourly pay. Federal wage rules for hourly (nonexempt) workers spell out when driving, flying and sitting in training count as hours worked.
- Normal home-to-work commuting is not work time, at a fixed location or different job sites.
- Travel during the workday, like site to site, is work time, and so is travel from a required meeting place.
- Overnight travel is work time when it cuts across your normal working hours, including on weekends.
- Training is unpaid only if it’s outside regular hours, truly voluntary, not directly job-related and involves no productive work.
Commuting
Under 29 CFR 785.35, home to work travel, “normal travel from home to work is not worktime,” whether you work “at a fixed location or at different job sites.”
Travel during the day
29 CFR 785.38, travel that is all in the day’s work says travel “as part of his principal activity, such as travel from job site to job site during the workday, must be counted as hours worked.” If you’re required to report to a meeting place for instructions or to pick up tools, the travel from there to the job is work “regardless of contract, custom, or practice.”
Overnight trips
Under 29 CFR 785.39, travel away from home community, travel that keeps you away overnight “is clearly worktime when it cuts across the employee’s workday,” including the same hours on nonworking days. If you normally work 9 to 5, travel during those hours on a Saturday counts. Regular meal periods don’t. As enforcement policy, the DOL doesn’t count time as a passenger outside regular working hours.
Training and meetings
29 CFR 785.27, lectures, meetings and training programs says training “need not be counted as working time” only if all four are true: it’s outside regular hours, it’s “in fact voluntary,” it’s “not directly related to the employee’s job,” and you do no productive work. Under 29 CFR 785.28, involuntary attendance, it isn’t voluntary if the employer requires it or you’re led to believe your job would be affected if you skip it.
What to do
- Track drive time between sites and required trainings separately.
- Check pay stubs against your log. Overtime may apply. See how bonuses affect overtime.
- Also see on-call time pay rules.
General information, not legal advice. State laws vary; check your state labor department or an employment attorney for your situation.
Header image: Photo: “WB FL 44 at Grand Avenue Traffic Circle-2” by DanTD, CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped).