University of Washington Human Resources

The Washington State Minimum Wage Act (WMWA) is the state law governing minimum wage, overtime and certain other aspects of pay for employees who work in Washington State. Outreach and enforcement for the WMWA are administered by the Washington State Department of Labor & Industries (L&I). In 2019 L&I updated the employment rules that determine which workers in Washington are required by law to be paid at least minimum wage, earn overtime pay, and receive paid sick leave and other protections under WMWA. Under the approved changes, the minimum pay a salaried worker must receive to be considered exempt will increase incrementally to 2.5 times the state minimum wage by 2028.

Workers who are not exempt from overtime must receive overtime pay of 1.5 times the employee’s regular pay rate for all hours worked over 40 hours in a seven-day workweek. The UW calls positions that are covered by overtime regulations “non-exempt” or “overtime eligible.” All hourly paid temporary and student workers are, by definition, overtime eligible. Only positions that meet certain narrowly defined criteria are exempt from the L&I’s overtime requirements. At the UW, the HR Compensation Office is responsible for determining the overtime status for all staff positions.

The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and Washington Minimum Wage Act (WMWA) establish minimum standards that may be exceeded but cannot be waived or reduced. The FLSA is federal law; the WMWA is state law. Employers must comply with any federal, state, or municipal laws, regulations or ordinances, or collective bargaining agreements or employer implemented policies that provide greater benefits than those established by the FLSA. When state laws differ from the federal FLSA, an employer must comply with the standard most generous to employees. At this time the WMWA is more generous to employees than the FLSA, so it is followed.

Effective January 1, 2025, the minimum actual gross salary a position can be paid and still remain overtime exempt will increase to an estimated $1,504.80 per week ($78,249.60 per year or $6,521 per month). As a result, professional staff, contract covered staff, classified non-union and represented civil service exempt staff overtime exempt positions that do not meet the new, higher weekly salary threshold must be changed to overtime eligible. This is still particularly true of part-time positions, since the threshold applies regardless of whether a position is part-time or full-time. For example, a professional staff employee with a full-time equivalent salary of $120,000 who works half time would have an actual gross monthly salary of $5,000 and would need to be in an overtime eligible job code.

The January 1 change mentioned above is one of a series of annual changes in the overtime threshold for employees who work in Washington State. These changes are required by a modification to Washington State overtime law that sets salary thresholds at the state level which will increase annually until January 1, 2028, when the state threshold reaches 2.5 times the Washington State minimum wage. From that point on, the state threshold will increase annually based on inflation by the same percentage that the Washington State minimum wage does. The first threshold change occurred in mid-2020, but resulted in a threshold of $675 per week, which was less than the federal threshold of $684 per week ($35,568 in annual terms or $2,964 per month), so during 2020 employers in Washington were obligated to follow the higher, federal threshold. Since the state threshold that takes effect January 1, 2025 is higher than the federal threshold, employers in Washington State will need to follow the higher state threshold. This approach follows the principle of law that in the event of a conflict between state and federal law, the law more protective of the employee will apply. To be exempt from overtime, employees must also meet one of the “duties tests”.

The state regulation is expressed in terms of weekly salary, not monthly or annual. At the University of Washington, salaries are expressed in monthly rates, paid on a twice a month payroll schedule. Determination of whether an employee meets the state, weekly salary threshold is made by converting the UW salary to a weekly rate (monthly x 12 / 52) and comparing this to the state weekly threshold. Sometimes in our communications we share the monthly or annualized equivalent of the weekly threshold to help employees relate it to the UW’s pay. Ultimately, however, the state threshold is a weekly rate.

More FLSA and WMWA information is available on the HR Compensation Office website at: FLSA and WMWA overtime eligibility and exemption.

Salaried classified, professional staff and represented civil service exempt staff employees who are currently OT exempt but whose actual pay is less than the state threshold will be moved into OT eligible job codes and must track their time starting Monday, December 30, 2024. For questions about possible impacts on non-represented academic personnel, please contact Academic Human Resources at acadpers@uw.edu.

All OT exempt job profiles have an OT eligible counterpart and conversely, some OT eligible job profiles have an OT exempt counterpart if they meet an FLSA duties test. The FLSA job profile pair is available in Workday when applicable. They can be found by searching for a job profile in Workday and looking within the Additional Data section and “FLSA Paired Job Profile Value” field.

January 1 falls on a Wednesday, and the UW workweek starts on Monday. To accurately account for overtime in a workweek that includes the effective date of the law, the UW is implementing the change at the beginning of the workweek.

The Compensation Office has provided a template letter to major organization budget administrators to send to affected employees and their immediate supervisors advising them of the change and the reason for the change.

Yes, the Compensation office will regularly audit for this scenario and request movement back to OT exempt job codes when an employee increments to a step above the salary threshold. Part of this audit will include a check that the department affirms that the employee’s duties have not substantially changed and that the duties of the position still meet the duties tests.

Per guidance from the U.S. Department of Labor, these revisions do not apply to ASEs because of their educational relationship with the UW.

UWHR will partner with Employee Workday Help to make the necessary job profile changes centrally. Employees will be moved from their overtime exempt job code and job profile to an overtime eligible job code and job profile.

The state threshold is a weekly amount and is applied per workweek. So even if the employee’s annualized rate is over the threshold, the test is based on weekly-equivalent salary rate in a workweek. The employee would need to be converted to the appropriate OT exemption for the weeks of the year that their actual salary falls below or above the threshold and can be converted back to the previous OT exemption status when those conditions end.

For example, if the plan is for the FTE to be reduced every summer, resulting in an actual salary that is below the salary threshold, the HR Compensation Office will confirm with the department and submit an edit position request to Employee Workday Help to move the employee into an overtime eligible job code. While in the overtime eligible job code, the employee will need to track all hours worked in Workday time tracking (or in KRONOS, if they are in the medical centers).

Similarly, when the employee’s FTE goes back up, resulting in an actual gross salary that meets the salary threshold, the HR Compensation Office will confirm an effective date with the department that avoids repayment of any OT pay the employee already earned and submit an edit position request to the Employee Workday Help to move the employee back into an overtime exempt job code. Once that is completed, the employee can stop tracking all hours worked. Of course, if the duties have significantly changed, a full position review would need to be submitted.

If the duties remain the same and the only change is the % FTE, Compensation does not need to review the FTE change. However, some major organizations may have additional requirements. Check with your organization’s leadership, if you have questions. Also, departmental contacts have been requested to inform HR Compensation of their plans if they intend to increase the FTE of an exempt pro staff employee so that the employee remains OT exempt when the salary threshold goes up. This will let HR Compensation know to remove the names of such employees from the list that will be sent to the Employee Workday Help to change to OT eligible jobs.

There are two possibilities:

1. If the employee is less than 100% FTE, the department may opt to increase the % FTE to a combination of salary and FTE that results in an actual salary paid that meets the new threshold. This requires typical departmental approvals but does not require HR Compensation Office approval. The employee should, of course, be consulted. Some employees have personal reasons not to work full-time.
2. Initiate an in-grade in Workday to increase the weekly salary to meet the threshold. The employee must meet one of the ingrade eligibility reasons: the justification cannot be to simply increase to the salary threshold. Ingrade requests for this require the same department approvals/sign-offs as ingrades at any other time, i.e., the relevant Dean or Vice President, or their designee.

The department should follow the guidance on the HR Compensation Office website at: Position and salary review.

No. A Temporary Pay Increase is by definition not part of the employee’s regular salary, and only salary is counted toward the salary threshold.

There are three possibilities:

1. If the employee is less than 100% FTE, the department may opt to increase the % FTE to a combination of salary and FTE that results in an actual salary paid that meets the new threshold. This requires typical departmental approvals but does not require HR Compensation Office approval, but the employee should, of course, be consulted. Some employees have personal reasons not to work full-time. Please note, in addition, that FTE increases will trigger a layoff/rehire option for contract classified employees represented by SEIU 925 and WFSE.
2. If the employee is not yet at the top automatic step of the range, the department may use the recruiting/retention process to place the employee on a higher step that meets or exceeds the new salary threshold. Departments are urged to consider internal equity when deciding whether to request recruiting/retention step increases related to the salary threshold change.
3. If an employee is eligible for a CEGP step and the department is supportive, the department may submit a request for move the employee to a CEGP step.

The department should follow guidance for a Recruitment/Retention Adjustment or CEGP step, as described on the HR Compensation Office website.

No. A classified staff Temporary Salary Increase is by definition not part of a salary, and only salary is counted toward the salary threshold.

Campus employees will be in Workday time tracking; medical centers employees will have their time tracked through KRONOS. For guidance on specific operational details such as who tracks time and how, and the process for supervisor approval of hours tracking, see the Employee Workday Help time entry webpage, which includes helpful resources. Another route to this information is via the Employee Workday Help’s home page under “Your Time & Absence”. Finally, there are also step-by-step user guides regarding entering and approving time in Workday.

Yes, they need to submit their time in Workday for supervisor approval, even if they are not working over 40 hours in a workweek. This is also true if they are part-time, and their scheduled hours are less than 40 in a workweek. Time tracking is necessary to ensure they are properly paid, and to create an official record of it.

No. However, UW follows the rules of Washington State Labor and Industries for out-of-state employees, unless the laws of the other state provide greater protection.

There is no one-size-fits-all answer to this question. The circumstances will be different for each individual position. Considerations should include:

• Economic impact on the department.
• Impact on equity with others in the same job profile or performing similar work.
• Impact on employee and team morale.
• Ability to reassign work to limit potential overtime.

The simplest thing to do would be to let the impact of the higher overtime threshold take its course, and all overtime exempt employees whose prorated salary falls below the new threshold would be moved into overtime eligible jobs. In some cases, however, the department may take action that preserves a position’s overtime exempt status. The question then becomes: how does my department determine when it makes good business sense to take action – i.e., increase salary and/or FTE?
Departments will want to consider the following:

If the position is 1.0 FTE, does the position regularly work no more than their weekly schedule hours (40 hours per week)? If so, changing the position from overtime exempt to overtime eligible will have little to no financial impact. The employee will have to track hours worked and will no longer be eligible for supervisor-approved partial day absences. If the employee does end up working over 40 hours in a week, they will earn overtime at time-and-a-half their regular rate of pay.

On the other hand, does the position regularly work more than 40 hours per week? If so, it may make good business sense to seek a pay increase to maintain the overtime exempt status of the position. Justification for such a request must meet the usual requirements whether it be an ingrade or position review for professional staff, or an R&R or CEGP for classified staff.

If a department is still unsure about which option to choose, a cost comparison may be helpful. Below is a hypothetical example:

A position has a salary of $68,004 per year ($5,667 per month), which is above the 2024 L&I salary threshold salary but below the projected 2025 L&I salary threshold. If the department takes no action to increase pay for this position it will become overtime eligible on December 30, 2024 (the first day of the UW workweek that contains January 1st). Any hours worked over 40 in a workweek will receive overtime at time-and-a-half the regular rate of pay. The department estimates that the employee works an average of 45 hours per week.

Perform the analysis below to determine the potential cost to the department for each option:

1. Calculate the estimated cost of OT

Divide the annual salary by 2080 (work hours in a year) to find the hourly rate	$68,004 / 2080 = $32.70/hr
Multiply the hourly rate by 1.5 to find the OT rate	$32.70 x 1.5 = $49.05/hr
Multiply the OT rate by the estimated number of hours exceeding 40 in a workweek to find the estimated weekly cost of OT	$49.05 x 5 = $245.25
Multiply the estimated weekly cost by 52 (weeks in a year) to find the estimated annual cost of OT	$245.25 x 52 = $12,753
The estimated annual cost of OT is $12,753/yr.

2. Calculate the estimated cost of increasing pay/FTE and maintaining OT exempt status

Subtract the current salary from the estimated 2025 threshold to find the estimate cost of the increase	$78,000 - $68,004 = $9,996
The estimated cost of increasing pay/FTE and maintaining OT exempt status is $9,996/yr.

Compare the two calculations: In this hypothetical example, it is less costly for the department to implement a 14.7% increase and keep the position overtime exempt (assuming it meets the usual criteria for the requested pay/FTE increase) than it is to pay 5 hours of OT each week.

No, OT eligible professional staff and UAW-RSE staff are not eligible for supervisor-approved partial-day absences. Because these employees are now OT eligible and are paid for their time worked, all missed time must be accounted for by appropriate paid time off. If the employee does not have accrued time off, the absence will be unpaid.Overtime-eligible professional staff and UAW-RSE staff may flex their schedules within a standard Monday to Sunday workweek, subject to the business needs of the departments in which they work. Such schedule flexing does not result in working over 40 hours in a workweek, and therefore would not result in overtime.