The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) has obtained a $166,832 settlement for 53 workers of Lakeside Roofing and Contracting LLC, a roofing contractor in Little Falls, N.Y., after uncovering overtime and record-keeping violations.

“Paying employees straight-time rates for overtime hours worked and incorrectly calculating hourly rates of pay when determining wages deprive workers of the hard-earned wages they depend on to make ends meet,” Jay Rosenblum, Wage and Hour Division (WHD) District Director in Albany, said in the DOL's March 7 announcement.

Lakeside Roofing and Contracting, operating as Lakeside Kanga Roof, paid straight time for travel time and all hours worked over 40 in a workweek; failed to record hours accurately; did not consider commissions and bonuses when calculating overtime pay; and did not show a poster summarizing the workers' Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) protections, the DOL reports in the announcement.

The company claimed that the workers were members of the corporation and did not qualify for overtime pay or employee benefits, but investigators determined otherwise, according to the report.

The division's Albany District Office's Rochester Field Office conducted the investigation. The WHD is responsible for enforcing FLSA protections for workers. 

The DOL encourages employers to comply with wage and hour laws and correctly pay employees, the agency states in the announcement, and provides an FLSA compliance toolkit employers can use to ensure that they comply with wage and hour laws.

The agency has numerous online resources for employers and workers, and workers with questions also can call WHD confidentially; the agency is able to speak with callers in more than 200 languages. The DOL also has an online search tools workers can use to learn if they are owed back wages that have been collected by the DOL, the agency states in the announcement.