Administrative Code Governing Career Service Employees

Career Service Employees

According to the law, all employees are to be paid for their services, while overtime in all cases is also subject to some sort of compensation, either by means of payment or by means of compensatory leave. The circumstances under which each type of remuneration should occur vary among employee types. What this means is that all employees who offer overtime work should be compensated in some way. The Florida Administrative Code also provides for this type of compensation for various employee types (Martin, 2010). Compensatory leave can therefore be defined as "time off from work in compensation for irregular or occasional overtime work…" (CompesationBLR, 2003).

According to the general rules for compensation, the directors' complaints are therefore valid. They are also valide in terms of the Florida Administrative Code (Stutler, 2006). According to Stutler (2006), Special Compensatory Leave can be awarded to Career Service employees in accordance with Chapter 60L-34.0032 of the Florida Administrative Code. The conditions under which such leave may be earned include: working during a holiday, working extra hours during a work week or holiday work period, when there is a holiday on the employee's regular days off, or when an employee is considered as essential employees during times of emergency when non-essential employees are excused from work.

According to the statute, Excluded Employees are those who are subject to a Biweekly Pay Period and 80 hours per 14 calendar days . According to the Code, these employees should be compensated for overtime by mean of sompensatory leave credits on an hourly basis for hours worked beyond the 80-hour work period, up to 240 hours per pay period. The code does not allow for leave beyond this amount of hours.

Employees who receive compesatory leave may use it in increments, as mutually agreed to by employees and supervisors. If there is no such agreement, the supervisor may require the employee to use the leave credits he or she accumulated. This is subject to five days' notice. Other conditions include that regular compensatory leave credits can be used for any purpose, subject to management approval. If the employee leaves the Career Service, no cash payments can be provided for compensatory leave credits.

What this means is that the directors are within their rights to demand compensatory leave up to 240 hours for overtime work.

To comply with the Florida Administrative code, the agency should carefully calculate the leave credits of every employee in the future, and award compensatory leave accordingly. Furthermore, employees should also be provided with the right to communicate any discrepancies between their leave awards and the actual hours of overtime for which they received credit. This should be their right without fear of recrimination.

A system should be implemented to regulate the compensatory leave calculation system in order to ensure that all leave is properly awarded and that the minimum likelihood of error can occur. The agency should also appoint officials to oversee the process of compensatory leave for these officials.

Because employees have received no compensatory leave for a number of years, the agency should take immediate steps to avoid litigation. The first step should be a thorough investigation to determine the amount of overtime for which no compensatory leave was awarded. Employee records and time schedules should be thoroughly investigated in this regard.

Once the amount of overtime has been determined, a system should be implemented to provide the directors with fair compensation. Because of the number of years of overtime that has accrued it is unviable to provide compensatory leave for all the hours accumulated. To mitigate this, it is suggested that a once-off bonus be calculated to compensate directors for their time. Although this is not in keeping with the Code, it is a solution that could be implemented once only for the purpose of practicality. The amount awarded should be in keeping with bonuses paid for overtime to included employees. This amount should also be negotiated among all parties involved in the dispute. It may be advisable to make use of a legal negotiator for this purpose, or alternatively, to include legal counsel for all parties involved.

Furthermore, the directors' accumulated leave over the last three months should be calculated and compesatory leave awarded accordingly.

At the fundamental level, all negotiations should be made on the assumption that the overtime service provided by the directors should be rewarded appropriately. It should also be provided on the basis of biweekly 80-hour periods successively, where fewer than this amount of hours should not receive any compensation.