Staffing Company Can Make Workers Pay Job-Site Transport Costs

A staffing company that provides workers with optional transportation to job sites can deduct the cost of that service from their wages and doesn’t owe them for travel time, a federal appeals court said Friday.

Pacesetter Personnel Service Inc. and related entities didn’t run afoul of wage-and-hour law by charging workers who used company-provided transportation $1.50 per trip, the US Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit said. The workers also sought pay for some travel-related tasks, but those activities weren’t integral and indispensable to their jobs’ core duties, the opinion said.

The workers allege Pacesetter’s practice of taking ...