Topic: Opinion Letter

Today, only one day before the end of President Trump’s Administration, the U.S. Department of Labor issued an opinion letter that certain owner-operator drivers that provide services to a transportation and logistics company are independent contractors and not employees under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act.  Owner-operator drivers have brought countless class and collective actions against transportation and logistics companies over the past decade, as reported in this blog.  One large transportation company paid $100 million to settle a collective and class action lawsuit brought by 20,000 owner-operators alleging independent contractor misclassification. This final-day opinion letter may be useful to logistics and other transportation companies defending these types of class actions, but it does not create a safe harbor under the FLSA. Rather, the most effective way by which transportation and logistics companies can elevate their level of compliance with federal and state IC laws is through the use of a process such as IC Diagnostics (TM), as discussed in the Takeaway below.