I am a public school bus driver. I work under a non-union contract. For my regular route I am paid salary. In our contract we are paid hourly for field trips and sports trips. We are paid overtime over 8 hours in a day not counting the hours of our regular route. In other words, our contract considers us to have two separate jobs, one salary and one special trips. We are now being told that the hours need to be added together and that we cannot work over 40 hours or the school has to pay us overtime. If this is the case our income will be cut drastically, because we count on those extra trips. Would there be a way for our contract to be changed so that we could be paid salary and hourly as two separate jobs that don't have to be added together?

Rita Risser Replies:

Legally, the school cannot treat the jobs as two separate jobs in this situation; it is the same job. That is why they are now counting the hours together. The supervisor has been told to keep it under 40 hours. If you only work 40 hours a week, then legally they can pay you a "salary," but you are considered a "salary non-exempt." That means that if you do work more than 40 hours a week, they must pay you overtime. Sorry. This is one situation where you cannot enter into a contract that is "better" than the law.

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