Labor Department Offers Guidance on Federal Labor Laws, Including Bonus Pay

The U.S. Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division on Monday issued six opinion letters designed to promote clarity, consistency, and transparency in the application of federal labor standards under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA).

The opinion letters provide official written interpretations from the division that address real-world questions and explain how laws apply to specific factual circumstances presented by individuals or organizations.

The opinion letters include:

• FLSA2026-1: Whether an employee’s role meets the criteria for the learned professional exemption under section 13(a)(1) of the FLSA, and, if so, whether an employer is nevertheless permitted to reclassify the employee as nonexempt.
• FLSA2026-2: Whether section 7(e) of the FLSA permits an employer to exclude certain bonus payments from an employee’s regular rate of pay. The letter also addresses how to include these payments in the calculation of employee overtime premiums if the payments must be included in an employee’s regular rate of pay.
• FLSA2026-3: Whether a union and employer can enter into a collective bargaining agreement that mandates a 15-minute “roll call” prior to each scheduled shift but excludes that time when calculating overtime premiums under the FLSA.
• FLSA2026-4: Whether, for purposes of the overtime exemption for certain commissioned employees in section 7(i) of the FLSA, an employer in a jurisdiction in which the state minimum wage exceeds the federal minimum wage must use the federal minimum wage, or alternatively, the higher state minimum wage, to determine whether it has satisfied the minimum pay standard in section 7(i)(1), and whether tips are deemed compensation for purposes of section 7(i)(2)’s requirement that more than half the employee’s compensation consist of commissions.
• FMLA2026-1: How a school closure of less than a full week impacts the amount of leave a school employee uses under the FMLA.
• FMLA2026-2: Whether FMLA leave may be used for time spent traveling to or from medical appointments, including cases in which an employee provided the employer with medical certification from a health care provider that confirms the employee’s need for the appointment, but the certification does not address travel to or from the appointment.

In June, Deputy Secretary of Labor Keith Sonderling announced the launch of the department’s opinion letter program, which expands the department’s longstanding commitment to providing meaningful compliance assistance that helps workers, employers, and other stakeholders understand how federal labor laws apply in specific workplace situations. The public is encouraged to use the division’s new opinion letters page to explore past guidance and submit new requests.