For example, consider Osborne v. JAB Management Services, a case recently decided by the 7th Circuit. Tara Osborne worked remotely as a technical support specialist for JAB, providing on-call support to its customers. As a salaried remote worker, she had the flexibility to design her own schedule. While she did not track any time worked over 40 hours per week, Osborne claimed she worked an average of 10 hours per day and 15 hours of overtime per week, including weekends.
The 7th Circuit affirmed the trial court's dismissal of Osborne's lawsuit for unpaid overtime.
According to the court, her evidence was too vague, inconsistent, and lacked the specificity needed to support her claim of working more than 40 hours per week without compensation. Her estimate of 15 hours of weekly overtime was unsupported by concrete details. She provided only vague descriptions of her tasks and could not explain how long she spent on specific duties or how often they occurred.
As the court correctly concluded: "If this claim survived summary judgment, then any FLSA claim in which the employee vaguely describes her schedule as having exceeded forty hours per week would reach a jury."
Off-the-clock pay issues are tricky for employers. The standard—that an employee must be paid if the employer knows or should have known the employee was working—is simple in theory but difficult in practice. When should an employer know that an employee is working? This case establishes that employees need more than just their own word to substantiate claims of unpaid work on a timesheet.