Domino’s franchisees urged the Sixth Circuit on Wednesday to reject the argument that the companies should have to use the IRS mileage rate when reimbursing pizza delivery drivers for the use of their personal vehicles.

Battle Creek Pizza Inc. and Team Pizza Inc. argued that wage-and-hour laws make it clear that they can reasonably approximate their drivers’ expenses when calculating how much to reimburse them. The companies face separate suits alleging they failed to adequately reimburse their drivers, pushing the workers’ hourly pay below minimum wage.

“Where I have a problem is where the employer supposedly reasonably approximates and the employee comes in and says, ‘You know what, in my individual case, your reasonable approximation is an underpayment,’” Judge Raymond M. Kethledge of the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit said.

The federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour and hasn’t gone up since 2009. That “isn’t a princely sum,” Kethledge said. “I’m having a hard time seeing how the employee isn’t right in that instance” and doesn’t need to “settle” for the employer’s reasonable approximation, the judge added.

But just because a particular company’s approximation might not actually be reasonable doesn’t mean that other employers can’t use that standard, Jeffrey C. Gerish, a Plunkett Cooney PC partner who argued the case for Battle Creek,...

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