Human Resource Blog

Oklahoma Attendance and Tardiness

	Attendance Management
Vacation Request / Response Form Weekly Time Sheets Attendance Calendar for 2008, 2009, or 2010 Annual Attendance Tracker Vacation Request Form for 2008, 2009, 2010 (Calendar) Detailed Absence Report

	Compensation
Employee Payroll Action Form W-4 Employee Withholding Allowance Cert. Employee Payroll Status/Change Form Direct Deposit Form Total Compensation Summary

In Oklahoma, if an employee forgets to clock in, can the employer dock his pay?

It would be unwise to dock an employee’s pay as a means of discipline in this case. The one who will end up being disciplined is the employer.

The Oklahoma minimum wage law makes it illegal to fail to pay an employee for time worked. That is the case in almost every other state as well.

Federal law is strict about this as well. The FLSA (Fair Labor Standards Act) demands that employees be paid for the time they work. The U.S. Labor Department’s Wage and Hour Division is extremely vigorous in pursuing such cases. An employer could face fines of more than $10,000 as well as back pay.

In short, then, an employer should not even think about docking workers for failing to clock in.

As many employers know, however, some employees will hide repeated tardiness by “forgetting” to clock in. What can employer do to develop a zero-tolerance policy about this?

Employers should keep accurate payroll records. It is required by both federal and state laws. Next, he or she should find other ways to figure out what time the employee started working. An employer could ask the employee’s co-workers. Or computer login time records could be checked. Cash register records may show when the employee began his or her workdays. Otherwise, the employer may have to take the worker’s word.

The company could establish a policy disciplining workers for failing to log in. Initially, a policy would need to be established. That policy would have to be communicated clearly to employees, via a written memo in a prominent place, for example. The policy could begin with a verbal warning for the first violation, followed by 3 written warnings. After that the employer could either terminate the employee or suspend him or her for 1 to 3 days without pay. If suspension is the next step, then termination could follow a 4^th violation.

A final warning is in order. If a worker put in overtime, working more than 40 hours a week, docking the employee for even 15 minutes would violate both state and federal overtime laws. JH