Overtime v. PTO

[Meloguy]

Jurisdiction

Oregon

Hi Counselor,
My Employer is based in Massachusetts and I work for them in Oregon.
When I work 12hour days two days in a week, but then get overtired from working 12hour days, my employer insists that I stay home and take PTO to finish the week. When THAT happens I lose 8 hours of OT to PTO. That is, I am told I must change my OT on Tuesday and Wednesday to Regular hours and absorb the time I took off on Friday. This results in a seriously reduced paycheck.
Are they right to force me to change my time card? Didn't I "earn" this PTO AND the OT?
Mel

 

[cbg]

In neither Massachusetts nor Oregon is overtime calculated on a daily basis. It doesn't matter how many hours you work in a single day; you have not earned overtime until you have worked more than 40 hours in a workweek. Doesn't matter a whit how many hours were in each day. So no, you are not losing any overtime.*

If your employer has a 40 hour workweek and you work two 12 hour days, you are due 24 hours of straight time. Not a single penny of it is required to be OT under Federal, Oregon, or Massachusetts law.*

Your employer, not you, has the final say over when you work, how many hours you work and when you take PTO. If he says, Don't come in and use PTO to get paid, then you don't come in and you use PTO to get paid.

* some industry specific rules apply in Oregon. To know if they apply in your situation, we would have to know what industry you work in.