CHARLESTON, W.Va. — West Virginia’s minimum wage workers are set to get a raise come Jan. 1, the first of two increases that will bring the wage to $8.75 by next year. But the West Virginia Chamber of Commerce, which did not initially oppose the wage hike, now has concerns that emergency rules written by the West Virginia Department of Labor exceed the authority of the law.
In a letter to John R. Junkins, acting commissioner of the DOL, Stephen G. Roberts, president of the state Chamber of Commerce, said the rules are “likely to confuse many employers … and that portions of the proposed emergency regulations may be unenforceable as they exceed the scope of the statutory revisions made by the Legislature.”
The DOL was authorized by the Legislature to write the rules, which Junkins submitted to Secretary of State Natalie Tennant in November.
Roberts did not expound on the number of state employers who might be confused by the rules, but did enumerate the ways in which he believes the DOL exceeded the scope of the law:
• Conflicts and Inconsistencies with the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). Junkins was charged with making the state’s law consistent with federal law under the FLSA; however, Roberts says that did not give the DOL leeway to change timekeeping standards.
The rules use “rounding intervals” of 15 and 6 minutes to determine an employee’s paid time on the job. For instance, when an employee arrives at or leaves work between 1 and 7.5 minutes before or after his or her scheduled work time, or at any time during his or her work day, the employee’s time shall be rounded back to the previous quarter hour. Likewise, when an employee leaves work between 1 and 3 minutes before or after his or her scheduled work time, or at any time during his or her work day the employee’s time will be rounded back to the previous 6 minutes.
If an employee arrives later than the scheduled work time, or leaves earlier than the scheduled end of the day, the time is rounded in favor of the employer.
The Chamber of Commerce also objects to rules on paid time for activities before and after work…
