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Incentive Pay

Pay raises to stay flat in ’08 while bonus plans take off

10/01/2007

If you’re holding the line on pay raises, you’re in good company. Three new surveys agree that most employers will raise salaries between 3.8% and 3.9% for the second year in a row in 2008, halting a steady upward trend in pay raises that began in 2004 …

Class action may be price for policies that invite off-the-Clock work

10/01/2007

Does your organization have top-down policies that tacitly create incentives for hourly employees to work extra hours without pay? If so, you may be risking a class-action wage-and-hour lawsuit. That’s what happened to one large employer when a disgruntled hourly employee claimed the company practically forced him to work extra hours in order to keep his job …

Deferred-Comp plans must comply with new rules starting Jan. 1

09/01/2007

The government hasn’t required much in the way of compliance when it comes to special executive retirement perks and bonuses. That changed in April, when Congress enacted a slew of IRS-enforced regulations known as 409A. Bring your deferred-comp plans into compliance now, or your executives could face stiff tax penalties.

Incentives for health assessment get employees into wellness

09/01/2007

To help create a culture of wellness, the Pepsi Bottling Group in Somers, NY, offered employees who participated in a health assessment a MasterCard prepaid with $75. The incentive worked: 70% of 33,500 U.S. employees participated …

Pay raises near 3.8% in ’08; more firms use bonuses

09/01/2007

A trio of new salary surveys from top consulting firms—Mercer, Hewitt and WorldatWork—predict that U.S. employers will dole out annual pay raises of about 3.8% in 2008, about the same level as this year …

Raises to remain flat in ’08, but bonuses gain favor

08/21/2007

A trio of closely watched national salary surveys say that employers plan to dole out annual pay raises of about 3.8% in 2008. The biggest trend: Employers are devoting an increasing amount of their salary budgets to bonuses. Here’s how to keep your bonus programs fair and legal…

Employees earn bonuses despite $12.7 billion in company losses

08/01/2007

Even though Ford Motor Company lost $12.7 billion last year, the Dearborn, MI-based automaker awarded “modest” performance awards in March to more than 115,000 employees …

Hourly bonuses for salaried employees?

08/01/2007

Q. I employ a physical therapist on a salaried basis, making her an exempt professional under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). Can I pay her an hourly bonus without causing her to lose the exempt status? …

Arbitration covers claims for unpaid bonus and severance

07/01/2007

The California Court of Appeal recently ruled that binding arbitration mandated by an arbitration agreement could determine a former employee’s wage claims for an unpaid profit-sharing bonus and severance pay …

‘Spiffs’ don’t count when establishing overtime exemption

07/01/2007

If you have an incentive system in which employees who sell a particular item get an additional set payment—commonly called a “spiff”—on top of other payments for selling the item, you can’t count the spiff as part of the commission …