Re: "Are technical writers the unsung heroes of document generation?"

[Robert Lauriston <robert -at- lauriston -dot- com>]

You're missing California Labor Code Â515.5(b)(5), which was added to
the law at the behest of the National Writers' Union in the dot-com
days. This was upheld in court and many companies changed their
policies as a result.

http://www.law360.com/articles/182825/sun-micro-s-5m-settlement-with-tech-writers-ok-d

California Labor Code section 515.5:

(a) Except as provided in subdivision (b), an employee in
the computer software field shall be exempt from the requirement that
an overtime rate of compensation be paid pursuant to Section 510 if
all of the following apply:
   (1) The employee is primarily engaged in work that is intellectual
or creative and that requires the exercise of discretion and
independent judgment.
   (2) The employee is primarily engaged in duties that consist of
one or more of the following: ...
   (3) The employee is highly skilled and is proficient in the
theoretical and practical application of highly specialized
information ...
   (4) The employee's hourly rate of pay is not less than ...

   (b) The exemption provided in subdivision (a) does not apply to an
employee if any of the following apply:
...
   (5) The employee is a writer engaged in writing material,
including box labels, product descriptions, documentation,
promotional material, setup and installation instructions, and other
similar written information, either for print or for onscreen media
or who writes or provides content material intended to be read by
customers, subscribers, or visitors to computer-related media such as
the World Wide Web or CD-ROMs.




On Fri, Jun 19, 2015 at 6:45 PM, Gene Kim-Eng <techwr -at- genek -dot- com> wrote:
> If your regular pay exceeds $82,000 (I'm rounding up here) AND you and your
> employer are both willing to assert that the work you do does NOT consist of
> repetitive, rote tasks and DOES require creativity, discretion and/or
> independent judgement, you can still be exempt under the 2008 California
> law.
>
> In practice, anytime you work through a temp agency, you're going to get
> classified as non-exempt no matter what you and your employer/s assert,
> because working as a temp pretty much defines you as interchangeable
> commodity labor in the eyes of the state. But as long as you are full-time
> direct and make more than the threshold pay level, the biggest determinant
> in whether employers want to classify you as exempt or non-exempt is really
> going to be whether they really understand the law and whether someone who
> had your job before you raised a stink about not getting OT pay. Because
> they obviously don't WANT to have to pay you OT.
>
> Gene Kim-Eng
>
>
>
>
> On 6/19/2015 5:59 PM, Janoff, Steven wrote:
>>
>> Yes, have you found a legitimate exemption to that one?
>
>
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