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Are Shift Supervisors Exempt From Overtime?

Your job may involve both coordinating the manual work of others on a job and doing the manual work yourself.  Employers may take the position that shift supervisors or line supervisors are exempt because they have authority to direct the work of others on the site.

This is not always legal.  Even if they are paid on a salary, and their title includes the word "supervisor," they must still have the exempt duties as their primary duties.  For a supervisor, these are:

• Your primary duty must be managing the enterprise or a recognized department or subdivision.
• You must customarily and regularly direct the work of at least two or more other full-time employees.
• You must have the authority to hire or fire other employees. If you do not have direct hiring authority they may still be exempt if their recommendations are given particular weight in the hiring or firing process.

If you do not meet this test, and/or if you do these things some of the time but the majority of your time is spent doing the same tasks as non-exempt employees, you may be entitled to overtime pay if you work more than forty hours per week.


Learn more here about overtime exemptions under Massachusetts and federal law.

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