In 2025 alone, more than 5,700 new lawsuits alleging Fair Labor Standards Act violations were filed in federal court, not including state court claims.
The FLSA has been on the books since 1938, and the same core issues -- misclassification, off-clock work, and payroll errors -- keep driving new claims year after year. But what has changed is the environment. Remote work, always-on technology, and state wage-hour laws have made compliance more difficult, even for employers who have never had a problem before.
The stakes are also higher than many employers realize. An FLSA violation can expose an employer to back wages, liquidated damages in an amount equal to the unpaid wages, and attorneys’ fees that may exceed the amount recovered by the employee. Because the FLSA also permits collective actions, one seemingly minor violation can result in significant monetary exposure when multiplied by the number of affected current and former employees.
Here are six of the most common wage and hour violations, with practical steps to address them.
The FLSA “default” is that employees are entitled to overtime for any hours worked in excess of 40 during a given workweek. There are a number of exemptions, but they are the exception, not the rule. It is not uncommon for nonexempt employees to be misclassified as “exempt.” And they often work significant unrecorded overtime.
The three most common white-collar exemptions -- executive, administrative, and...
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