Therefore, the time, no matter how minimal, that an employee is required to spend putting on and taking off gear on the employer’s premises is compensable “work” under the FLSA.Īs noted above, the Supreme Court’s central holding in Alvarez is that time spent after the beginning of the first principal activity, including time spent walking, is not affected by section 4(a) of the portal-to–portal Act, 29 U.S.C. 680 (1946), the Court noted that it defined “the statutory workweek” to “include all time during which an employee is necessarily required to be on the employer’s premises, on duty or at a prescribed workplace.” The Court in Alvarez then emphasized that, other than its express exceptions for travel to and from an employee’s principal activity and for other preliminary or postliminary activities, the portal-to-portal Act does not change the conception of “work” or define the workday. 126 (1944), that “exertion” was not necessary for an activity to constitute “work.” Two years later, in Anderson v. 590 (1944), as “physical or mental exertion (whether burdensome or not) controlled or required by the employer and pursued necessarily and primarily for the benefit of the employer and his business,” it soon clarified, in Armour & Co. The Court stated that it has defined the terms “work” and “workweek” “broadly.” It explained that although it had initially defined “work,” in Tennessee Coal, Iron & R.Co. In order to reach this result, the Supreme Court reviewed and reaffirmed its historic definition of “work” under the FLSA. The Court also held that waiting time before the first principal activity is not compensable, unless the employees are required to report to work at a specific time. 254, and thus time spent in those activities, as well as any walking and waiting time that occurs after the employee engages in his first principal activity and before he finishes his last principal activity, is part of a “continuous workday” and is compensable under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), 29 U.S.C. The Court determined that donning and doffing gear is a “principal activity” under the portal to portal Act, 29 U.S.C. The Supreme Court’s unanimous decision in Alvarez holds that employees who work in meat and poultry processing plants must be paid for the time they spend walking between the place where they put on and take off protective equipment and the place where they process the meat or poultry. 514 (2005) (together with Barber Foods v. This memorandum advises staff of the state of the law after the Supreme Court’s decision in IBp v.
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