Most states participate in daylight savings time. Those employees working the graveyard shift when Daylight Savings Time begins work one hour less because the clocks are set ahead one hour. Those employees working the graveyard shift when Daylight Savings Time ends work an extra hour because the clocks are set back one hour at 2:00 a.m.
For example:
The scheduled shift starts at 11:00 p.m. and ends at 7:30 a.m. the next day, your employee works an eight- hour shift and receives a 30-minute lunch break.
On the Sunday that Daylight Savings Time starts at 2:00 a.m., the employee does not work the hour from 2:00 a.m. to 3:00 a.m. because at 2:00 a.m. all of the clocks are turned forward to 3:00 a.m. Thus, on this day the employee only worked 7 hours, even though the schedule was for 8 hours.
The system will display the actual times but calculate based on the above, so the timecard will look like this:
In | Meal Start | Meal End | Out | HRS |
11p | 3a | 330a | 730a | 7hrs |
On the Sunday that Daylight Savings Time ends at 2:00 a.m., the employee works the hour from 1:00 a.m. to 2:00 a.m. twice because at 2:00 a.m. all of the clocks are turned back to 1:00 a.m. Thus, on this day the employee worked 9 hours, even though the schedule only reflected 8 hours.
The system will display the actual times but calculate based on the above, so the timecard will look like this:
In | Meal Start | Meal End | Out | HRS |
11p | 3a | 330a | 730a | 9hrs |
The FLSA requires that employees must be credited with all of the hours actually worked. Therefore, if the employee is in a work situation similar to that described in the above example, he or she worked 7 hours on the day that Daylight Savings Time begins and 9 hours on the day that Daylight Savings Time ends.
Note: If your state does not participate in Daylight Savings Time, this will not impact you.