Almost exactly one year ago today, I posted " Misclassifying Oil and Gas Workers as Independent Contractors Can Be Costly." This post discussed the consequences of misclassifying a worker as an independent contractor.

Yesterday, the United States Department of Labor issued a press release concerning "one of the largest recoveries of overtime wages in recent years." Halliburton has reportedly agreed to pay over $18 million in overtime owed to more than 1,000 employees. The Casper Star Tribune reports that 27 Wyoming residents will be paid $506,000.

The Department of Labor press release provides the following:

Investigators found Halliburton incorrectly categorized employees in 28 job positions as exempt from overtime. The company did not pay overtime to these salaried employees — working as field service representatives, pipe recovery specialists, drilling tech advisors, perforating specialists and reliability tech specialists — when they worked more than 40 hours in a workweek...

This was reportedly part of an ongoing, multi-year compliance initiative in the oil and gas industry in the Southwest and Northeast.

It is important for companies in the oil and gas industry to not only carefully monitor that independent contractors are properly classified, but also that employees are properly categorized.

What I stated one year ago holds true: The message being sent to the oil and gas industry is clear – failure to properly classify workers can be costly.

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