As the new Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) ruling on the minimum salary for overtime exemption comes into effect on Dec 1st, institutions are starting to indicate how they will change postdoc salaries in response.

For example, Boston University (BU) is raising postdoc salaries to a minimum of $47,500 by December 1, 2016, and the University of Florida is providing salary increases for postdocs to a minimum of $47,476 by December 1, 2016, and increased the minimum salary requirement for newly hired postdocs to $47,476 as of July 1, 2016.

These responses seem fairly typical as the easiest solution for institutions, to simply raise salaries rather then undertake the tracking of hours, for which the institution is responsible. However, there is at least one case of an institution that appears to be going down the route of requiring postdocs to fill out timesheets – the University of Nebraska:

“Beginning Dec. 1, postdoctoral researchers who fall under the minimum base salary threshold of $913 a week ($47,476 for a full-year worker) and are not exempted from the threshold, will change to hourly pay status and be eligible for overtime payments. Timesheets will be required.”

Do you know what your institution is doing? Is your institution talking to either the postdoctoral association or postdoctoral office about what they are planning? We are going to build a resource here on the Future of Research website to gather all of this information together. Please feel free to send information to info@futureofresearch.org or to contact us on social media.

The Boston Postdoctoral Association (BPDA) has created a guide to the FLSA overtime rule and what it means for postdocs, which can be found here.