District of Columbia Overtime Laws & Calculator

Weekly. District of Columbia sets no daily threshold, so a twelve-hour day owes no premium on its own — those hours go into the week's total like any others, and the count that decides your pay is hours past 40 in a single workweek.

No. Four ten-hour days is 40 hours, and the weekly rule starts past 40 hours, not at them. Day length does not matter in District of Columbia: four tens, five eights and three long shifts all pay the same if the week's total is the same.

No District of Columbia statute sets a double-time rate. Where double time appears on a stub here it comes from a union agreement, a company policy or a holiday practice — worth having in writing, but it is an agreement rather than the law. What the statute requires is time and a half past 40 hours in a workweek, with no daily threshold.

District of Columbia has no seventh-day rule. Those hours count toward the workweek like any others, so a seven-day stretch usually produces overtime through the weekly total instead: seven eight-hour days is 56 hours, of which 16 are past 40.

Yes. The District's Minimum Wage Revision Act (D.C. Code Chapter 10) sets its own overtime rule in D.C. Code § 32-1003(c): an employer may not employ an employee for a workweek longer than 40 hours unless the employee is paid at least one and one-half times the regular rate for the hours over 40, subject to the exemptions in § 32-1004 and § 32-1003(e). That is the same weekly rule as the federal FLSA (29 U.S.C. § 207(a)(1)), and § 32-1003(c) measures overtime by the workweek and sets no separate daily threshold. The D.C. Department of Employment Services (DOES) and the Attorney General's office describe the rule the same way. D.C. and federal law differ in coverage, exemptions and remedies, which the next answers cover.

Yes, on the wording of the two statutes. The federal overtime rule (29 U.S.C. § 207(a)(1)) covers employees who are themselves engaged in commerce or who work for an enterprise engaged in commerce. Under 29 U.S.C. § 203(s)(1), an enterprise generally qualifies if it has employees engaged in commerce or handling goods that moved in commerce and its annual sales or business done is at least $500,000; hospitals, schools and public agencies qualify regardless of dollar volume. D.C. Code § 32-1002(3) defines “employer” to include the D.C. government and any individual, partnership, corporation or other person, but not the United States government, and § 32-1003(c) contains no sales or commerce condition. So, on the wording, a small employer that falls outside the federal tests may still owe D.C. overtime for work in the District. The exemptions also differ. Section 32-1004(a) exempts from both the minimum wage and overtime executive, administrative, professional and outside sales employees (as defined by the Secretary of Labor under the FLSA) and employees who deliver newspapers to consumers' homes. Section 32-1004(b) lists these overtime-only exemptions: seamen; railroad employees; salesmen, partsmen and mechanics at nonmanufacturing automobile, trailer and truck dealers; and air-carrier employees who voluntarily swap workdays to use air travel benefits. Section 32-1003(e) adds an exception for retail or service employees whose regular rate is more than 1 1/2 times the minimum hourly rate and who earn more than half their pay over a representative period of at least a month from commissions. The federal list in 29 U.S.C. § 213(b) is not the same; for example, it exempts employees whose qualifications and maximum hours of service the Secretary of Transportation can set (§ 213(b)(1)) and employees of an air carrier subject to Title II of the Railway Labor Act, without the workday-swap limit (§ 213(b)(3)). Whether a particular job is exempt depends on its duties and employer, which this page cannot tell.

The D.C. Department of Employment Services (DOES) Office of Wage-Hour takes unpaid-overtime claims on a Minimum Wage/Overtime Complaint form, a fillable PDF that can be delivered, mailed to 4058 Minnesota Ave. NE, Washington, D.C. 20019, or emailed; its phone number is (202) 671-1880. DOES says people who worked in Maryland or Virginia must contact those states' labor departments instead, and the D.C. Attorney General's office says workers can report suspected violations to it at (202) 724-7730. An employer that underpays is liable for the unpaid wages, statutory penalties and liquidated damages equal to treble the unpaid wages (§ 32-1012(b)(1)), compared with an additional equal amount under the FLSA (29 U.S.C. § 216(b)). The court may award liquidated damages of less than treble, but not less than the unpaid wages, only if the employer shows that it acted in good faith, had reasonable grounds to believe it was not violating the law, and promptly paid the full amount claimed (§ 32-1012(b)(2)). A worker can also sue, and a worker who prevails is awarded reasonable attorneys' fees and costs (§ 32-1308(a)(1)(A)). A suit must be commenced within 3 years after the cause of action accrued (or the last occurrence, if the violation is continuous), and the period is tolled from when the worker files an administrative complaint with the Mayor or the Mayor's designated agent (§ 32-1301(4)) until the Mayor notifies the worker in writing that it is resolved or the worker withdraws it, whichever is sooner (§ 32-1308(c)). Under the FLSA the period is 2 years, or 3 for willful violations (29 U.S.C. § 255(a)).

Usually, yes. The multiplier is applied to the regular rate, not to your base wage, and the regular rate takes in nondiscretionary bonuses, production and attendance bonuses, and shift differentials for the week they were earned. An overtime hour in a week with a night differential is worth more than base × 1.5. Bonuses that are genuinely discretionary — not promised in advance — stay out of it. The federal rules for building the regular rate are at 29 C.F.R. Part 778 and apply in District of Columbia.

Not by itself. A salary is a way of paying, not an exemption. The white-collar exemptions turn on the work actually performed together with how and how much you are paid, and the duties tests at 29 C.F.R. Part 541 do not include job titles. A salaried employee whose duties fall outside those tests is owed overtime on the same 40-hour week as anyone else.