Your Employer Must Pay for This: FLSA Rules on Training, Meetings, On-Call, and Waiting Time

Most workers know their employer owes them pay for the hours they spend actively doing their jobs. What workers often don’t realize, and what some employers exploit, is that mandatory training, pre-shift meetings, time spent on call from home, and the unpredictable downtime between assignments also count as work time under federal law. The short answer is: in many cases, yes. The Fair Labor Standards Act defines “work” broadly, and decades of regulations and Supreme Court decisions confirm that certain non-productive time still belongs on the timecard. Here is what the law actually says about training, meetings, on-call duty, and waiting time, and how workers can spot the hours their employer should have paid.

The Foundation: “Suffer or Permit to Work”

The FLSA defines the term “employ” to include “to suffer or permit to work.” That phrase, found at 29 U.S.C. § 203(g), reaches further than most workers realize. It captures more than the time spent at the workstation doing the principal job. The employer must generally pay for any time it requires, knows about, or benefits from, with limited exceptions the Portal-to-Portal Act of 1947 and a handful of specific Department of Labor regulations carve out.

That principle drives the analysis of training, meetings, on-call duty, and waiting time. Each of those categories involves activity that sits outside the worker’s principal job but ties closely to it. Whether the employer must pay for the time depends on the specific facts and the applicable regulation.

Training Programs and Educational Time

The employer must generally pay for time the worker spends in employer-required training, lectures, meetings, and similar activities. The Department of Labor’s regulation at 29 C.F.R. § 785.27 sets out a four-part test for the narrow situations in which training time may fall outside paid work time. All four conditions must hold. If even one is missing, the employer must pay for the training.

The Four-Factor Test for Unpaid Training

Training generally counts as unpaid time only when ALL of the following are true:

• Attendance falls outside the employee’s regular working hours.
• Attendance is in fact voluntary.
• The course, lecture, or meeting does not relate directly to the employee’s job.
• The employee performs no productive work during attendance.

If any one of these factors fails, the employer owes pay for the time. In practice, this means most workplace training qualifies as paid work time, because most workplace training is either mandatory, related to the job, conducted during working hours, or all three.

When Training Is “Mandatory” Versus “Voluntary”

Training is not voluntary if the employer requires it, schedules it, or pressures the employee into attending. The regulations specifically state that training is not voluntary if “the employee is given to understand or led to believe that his present working conditions or the continuance of his employment would be adversely affected by nonattendance.” In other words, a manager saying “attendance is optional, but it’s strongly encouraged” generally does not make the training voluntary in any legal sense.

Required onboarding, orientation, certification, safety training, compliance training, equipment training, system training, and continuing education tied to the worker’s job duties all generally count as paid work time when the employer requires them.

Required Study Time Outside Class

Department of Labor opinion letters confirm that when the employer requires training and the worker must study or prepare outside of class to pass it, the employer owes pay for the study time as well. Mandatory study, mandatory reading, mandatory practice testing, and mandatory online module completion tied to required training all generally count as work time.

Independent Schools and “Special Situations”

Two narrow exceptions exist. First, under 29 C.F.R. § 785.30, courses an employee attends on their own initiative at an independent school, college, or trade school after working hours do not count as paid work time, even when the courses relate to the job. Second, under 29 C.F.R. § 785.31, an employer-sponsored program that corresponds to courses offered by independent bona fide institutions of learning may fall outside paid work time when the employee attends voluntarily and outside working hours. Both exceptions are narrow, and the employer bears the burden of showing they apply.

Mandatory Meetings, Huddles, and Briefings

The same four-factor test that governs training also governs employer-required meetings. Pre-shift huddles, safety briefings, team meetings, assignment meetings, staff meetings, and any other employer-required gathering generally count as paid work time.

The mandatory nature of the meeting alone defeats the “voluntary” factor. As a result, almost all required workplace meetings count as work time, whether they happen at the beginning of the shift, at the end, or in the middle. If the employer requires the worker to attend, the time generally counts.

This is one of the most commonly missed forms of paid work time. A 10-minute pre-shift huddle five days a week adds up to roughly 43 hours per year of unpaid working time. If those hours push the worker over 40 in a given workweek, the overtime premium also applies.

On-Call Time

Few areas of FLSA law produce more confusion than on-call time. The Supreme Court settled the basic framework back in 1944, when it decided Skidmore v. Swift & Co., 323 U.S. 134, and Armour & Co. v. Wantock, 323 U.S. 126. The framework those decisions built remains the law today.

“Engaged to Wait” Versus “Waiting to Be Engaged”

The Supreme Court drew a line between two kinds of waiting: a worker who is “engaged to wait,” meaning the waiting itself forms part of the job, and a worker who is “waiting to be engaged,” meaning the worker is essentially off duty and free to use the time for personal purposes. The employer must pay for the first. The employer does not have to pay for the second.

The classic example of being engaged to wait is a firefighter playing checkers between alarms. The fact that the firefighter is not actively fighting a fire does not mean the time stops counting. The worker’s readiness to respond forms part of the service the employer is buying, and that readiness restricts the worker’s freedom in ways that matter.

Factors Courts Consider

When a worker challenges on-call time, courts apply a totality-of-the-circumstances test that weighs several factors. No single factor controls. The key questions include:

• Geographic restrictions. Must the worker remain on the employer’s premises, or within a specific radius? A short geographic leash points toward paid work time.
• Response time. How quickly must the worker respond to a call? A 5- or 10-minute response window severely restricts personal activity. A 30-minute or longer window is generally less restrictive.
• Frequency of actual calls. How often does the employer actually call the worker in? Frequent interruptions push the analysis toward paid work time, even when individual calls are short.
• Use of pagers, cell phones, or apps. Carrying a device that lets the worker move freely is less restrictive than being tied to a landline or workstation.
• Ability to trade shifts. Can the worker swap on-call shifts with co-workers? Greater flexibility points away from paid work time.
• Practical impact on personal life. Can the worker realistically shop, dine, attend events, or care for family during the on-call period? Or do the restrictions weigh so heavy that the time effectively belongs to the employer?
• Restrictions on personal activities. Some employers prohibit alcohol use, sleep, or other activities during on-call shifts. Heavy restrictions push toward paid work time.

If the on-call rules make it impossible to live a normal life during the shift, courts are much more likely to treat that time as paid work time under the FLSA.

Waiting Time Throughout the Workday

Waiting time at the workplace, separate from on-call duty, falls under 29 C.F.R. §§ 785.14 to 785.16. The basic rule mirrors the on-call analysis. Short, unpredictable periods of inactivity during the workday generally count as paid work time, because the employer controls how the worker uses that time.

Paid Waiting Time: When the Employer Controls the Clock

The Department of Labor’s regulation lists examples of waiting time the employer must pay for, including:

• A secretary reading between dictations.
• A messenger working a crossword puzzle while awaiting assignments.
• A factory worker waiting for machinery repairs.
• A repair technician waiting for a customer to be ready.
• A delivery driver sitting in the cab while goods load.

In each case, the waiting is short, unpredictable, and tied to the principal job. The worker cannot use the time for personal purposes. The employer must pay for the waiting time, even when the worker may leave the immediate workstation.

Unpaid Waiting Time: When the Worker Is Free to Leave

The opposite holds for waiting time long enough and unrestricted enough to allow personal use. Periods during which the employee is “completely relieved from duty” and which are “long enough to enable him to use the time effectively for his own purposes” generally do not count as paid work time. The employer must tell the employee in advance that they are free to leave and when they need to return.

Travel Time at a Glance

Travel time has its own set of rules at 29 C.F.R. §§ 785.35 to 785.41. The basics:

• Home-to-work commute. Ordinary commuting between home and the regular workplace generally does not count as paid work time, even when the worker travels long distances.
• Travel between job sites. Travel during the workday from one job site to another generally counts as paid work time as part of the continuous workday.
• Special one-day assignments. Travel to a one-day assignment in another city generally counts as paid work time, except for the time the worker would have normally spent commuting to the regular work site.
• Overnight travel. Travel away from home that cuts across normal work hours generally counts as paid work time, even on what would otherwise be a non-workday. Travel outside normal hours generally does not.

What You May Be Able to Recover

Under the FLSA, a worker who wins an unpaid hours-worked claim may recover:

• Back wages for all unpaid hours during the limitations period, at the worker’s regular rate.
• Overtime premiums when the unpaid hours, added to other hours, push the worker over 40 in a workweek.
• Liquidated damages equal to the unpaid wages under 29 U.S.C. § 216(b), effectively doubling the recovery in many cases.
• Attorney’s fees and court costs, which the FLSA generally requires the employer to pay when the worker prevails.
• Interest where applicable.

State laws often add more remedies, including longer statutes of limitations, additional penalties for wage statement and final paycheck violations, and personal liability for individual managers and owners. The amount any individual worker may recover depends on the specific facts of the case, the rate of pay, the period at issue, and the applicable law. Past case outcomes do not guarantee a similar result in any future matter.

Time Limits to File

Workers must file federal FLSA claims within two years of the violation, or three years for willful violations. Several states allow longer windows. New York allows six years under NYLL § 198(3). California allows three years for most wage claims, with up to four years available under the Unfair Competition Law. Texas allows 180 days for state Payday Law claims through the Texas Workforce Commission, though FLSA windows remain available separately.

What to Do If You Think You Are Owed Hours-Worked Wages

Track Your Hours

Keep a personal daily log of your arrival, your departure, time spent in training and meetings, time spent on call, and time spent waiting between assignments. The more contemporaneous the records, the better.

Save the Proof

Hold onto pay stubs, schedules, on-call rosters, training rosters and certificates, meeting agendas, dispatch logs, and any written communications about your hours or availability requirements.

Note the Patterns

Does your employer routinely auto-deduct breaks you did not take? Does your manager expect you to be ready to work at your scheduled start time even though you arrive earlier to prepare? Do you carry a pager that the employer never pays you for? Specific patterns map onto specific legal claims.

Consult an Attorney Before the Clock Runs Out

Talk to an experienced wage and hour attorney before the statute of limitations runs. Many firms handle unpaid-hours cases on a contingency-fee basis, meaning a worker generally pays no attorney’s fees unless the case produces a recovery.

If the Employer Requires It, the Employer Generally Has to Pay for It

Mandatory training, required meetings, restrictive on-call duty, and waiting time the employer controls are not “favors” the worker does on personal time. They are part of the job, and the FLSA generally requires the employer to pay for them. Whether any particular worker has a valid claim depends on the specific facts of their employment and the applicable law. If you have been showing up early for huddles, sitting through unpaid training, carrying a pager that controls your evenings, or waiting around between assignments without pay, the law may give you the ability to recover those hours, plus liquidated damages, interest, and attorney’s fees.

Josephson Dunlap, Lawyers for the Workers®, represents employees nationwide in wage and hour matters. We offer confidential case evaluations at no cost.