The Service Contract Act, in plain English

What the SCA asks of a route operator

The McNamara-O'Hara Service Contract Act (41 U.S.C. chapter 67) generally covers federal contracts over $2,500 whose main purpose is providing services through service employees. Highway Contract Route and Contract Delivery Service contracts with the Postal Service are typically among them, so the drivers on those routes are owed at least the wages and fringe benefits in the wage determination attached to the contract.

Wage determination (WD)

The Department of Labor schedule attached to a contract. It lists each job classification with its minimum hourly rate, and the fringe benefits owed, for the place the work is done. A contract can carry a different WD from the one next to it, and WDs are revised over time.

Health & welfare (H&W) fringe

An hourly amount owed on top of the wage, paid as bona fide benefits, as cash in lieu, or a mix. The WD and its footnotes set the rate and how many hours it applies to, which is often capped per week.

Holidays and vacation

Many WDs list paid holidays and vacation earned by length of service. Which rate holiday hours are paid at is one of the places the rules leave room for more than one reading.

Overtime

The SCA itself sets no overtime rule. Overtime comes from other federal and state laws, which generally require time and a half for hours over 40 in a workweek. Which law applies, whether an exemption does, and how the rate is worked out when a driver earns more than one rate in a week all depend on the contract and the driver. Where the answer isn't clear, RouteWage flags it for a person to confirm.

State rules

State wage-and-hour laws apply alongside the SCA: minimum wages, daily overtime, pay-stub contents, and pay frequency all vary by state.

How RouteWage encodes the rules

Every wage rule is encoded from its primary source, and every uncertain rule is flagged for review. Each pay line carries a “Why?” explanation of the rule and the figures behind it, so anyone reviewing a run can see how an amount was reached.

Where the law is unclear, RouteWage applies the conservative reading, labels it on the pay line, and flags it for a person to confirm before the run is approved. Nothing is silently assumed.

A full audit trail on every calculation

Each amount records the hours, rate, rule, and wage determination that produced it. Changes are written to a tamper-evident log, and a worker's documents and signed agreements are kept to the SCA's three-year retention. When a Department of Labor investigator asks, the records for a period can be exported as one package.