This Littler Lightbulb highlights some of the more significant employment and labor law developments in the federal courts of appeal in the last month.
Fifth Circuit Holds Plaintiff Not Entitled to Overtime Unless Company Had Actual or Constructive Knowledge of Time Worked
Following a jury verdict finding the plaintiff in Merritt v. Tex. Farm Bureau, __F.4th __ (5th Cir. Feb. 6, 2026) was not entitled to overtime pay because the employer did not have actual or constructive knowledge of the overtime worked, the plaintiff filed motions seeking to overturn the verdict, which the district court denied.
On appeal to the Fifth Circuit, the plaintiff, who was classified as an independent contractor, was paid on commission and did not have an obligation to report hours worked, argued that because the company allowed him to work unlimited hours, it had an obligation to pay him overtime and knowledge of his overtime work was irrelevant. The Fifth Circuit rejected this argument, stating that allowing an employee to work as much as they please does not mean that an employer’s knowledge of overtime work is irrelevant, noting that it has “consistently required employees claiming an entitlement to overtime pay to prove their employer’s ‘knowledge, actual or constructive, that [the employees] w[ere] working’ overtime.”
Next the court rejected the plaintiff’s argument that the company’s lack of a timekeeping system constituted constructive knowledge of his overtime and that the lack of a...
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