Executive exemption
Hawaii exempts executive employees from its minimum wage and overtime requirements. HI Statutes 387-1 Employees qualify as executive employees if they:
- receive a fixed weekly salary of more than $210 exclusive of reasonable costs to the employer for board, lodging, or other facilities;
- have primary duties consisting of managing the business or a customarily recognized department or subdivision of the business;
- direct the work of two or more employees on a customary and regular basis;
- have authority to hire or terminate other employees or whose recommendations regarding hiring, termination, advancement, promotions or other employee status changes carry particular weight;
- exercise discretionary authority on a customary and regular basis.
Administrative exemption
Hawaii exempts administrative employees from its minimum wage and overtime requirements. HI Statutes 387-1 Employees qualify as administrative employees if they:
- receive a weekly fixed salary of more than $210 exclusive of the employer’s reasonable cost of board, lodging, or other facilities;
- have primary duties that include performing office or non-manual field work which directly relates to management policies or the general business operations of the employer or the employer’s customers, including work requiring the employee to exercise discretion and independent judgment. This employee may be one who:
- directly assists a proprietor or an individual employed in a bona fide executive or administrative capacity on a regular basis;
- requires only general supervision and performs specialized or technical work requiring special training, experience, or knowledge;
- requires only general supervision and executes special assignments or duties
Professional exemption
Hawaii exempts professional employees from its minimum wage and overtime requirements. HI Statutes 387-1 Employees qualify as professional employees if they:
- receives a weekly fixed salary or fee of more than $210, exclusive of reasonable costs for board, lodging, or other facilities, except when:
- the employee holds a valid license or certificate permitting the person to practice law or medicine and is actually engaging in the practice thereof;
- the employee holds a requisite academic degree for the general practice of medicine and is participating in an internship or residency program; or
- the employees works as a teacher and is certified or recognized in the school system or educational establishment in which he or she is employed.
- have primary duties consisting of:
- work that requires knowledge of an advanced type in a field of science or learning customarily acquired by a prolonged course of specialized intellectual instruction and study, as distinguished from a general academic education and from an apprenticeship, and from training in the performance of routine mental, manual, or physical processes;
- work in a recognized field of artistic endeavor considered to be original and creative in character (as opposed to work which can be created by an individual with general manual or intellectual ability or training), and the result of the works mainly depends on the invention, imagination, or talent of the individual;
- teaching, tutoring, instructing, or lecturing, so long as the employee is certified or recognized in the school system or educational establishment or institution by which the person is employed;
- whose work requires the employee to exercise discretion and judgment in its performance on a regular basis; and
- whose work is primarily intellectual and varied in character (as opposed to work deemed mental, manual, mechanical or physical) and is a type of work that the produced output or accomplished results cannot be standardized in relation to a given period of time.
Outside salesman exemption
Hawaii exempts outside salesmen from its minimum wage and overtime requirements. HI Statutes 387-1 Employees qualify as outsides salesman if they customarily and regularly engage away from their employer’s place of business in:
- making sales; or
- obtaining orders or contracts for service or for the use of facilities for which a consideration will be paid by the client or customer; and
- perform non-exempt work for no more than 40 percent of the hours worked in the workweek by non-exempt employees; except that the hours of work do not include hours of work of a nature other than sales or solicitations which are in excess of five percent of the hours worked in the workweek by the employer’s non-exempt employees.
Exempt work includes work performed incidental to and in conjunction with the employee’s own outside sales or solicitations.
Sales includes any sale, exchange, contract to sell, consignment for sale, shipment for sale, or other disposition in regards to tangible and intangible property.
Computer employee exemption
Hawaii minimum wage law does exempt computer systems analysts, computer programmers, software engineers, or other similarly skilled workers from its minimum wage requirements.
Other minimum wage and overtime exemptions
Hawaii exempts the following employees from its minimum wage and overtime requirements:
- individuals who receive guaranteed compensation totaling $2,000 or more a month, whether payment is made weekly, biweekly, or monthly;
- individuals working in agriculture for any workweek where the employer employs fewer than twenty (20) employees;
- individuals working in agriculture for any workweek in which the individual is engaged in coffee harvesting;
- individuals working in or about an employer’s home in domestic service on a casual basis or providing companionship services for the aged or infirm;
- individuals working as hours parents in or about a home or shelter maintained for child welfare purposes by a charitable organization exempt from income tax under section 501 of the federal Internal Revenue Code;
- individuals working by their brother, sister, brother-in-law, sister-in-law, son, daughter, spouse, parent, or parent-in-law;
- individuals working in a bona fide supervisory capacity, defined as individuals who:
- are compensated on a fixed salary of not less than $210 per week, exclusive of reasonable costs for board, lodging, or other facilities;
- have the primary duty of supervising or directing other employees; and
- customarily and regularly direct the work of at least five (5) employee.
- individuals working as outside collectors, defined as individuals who:
- are customarily and regularly engage away from their employer’s place of business in:
- collecting money for goods or services previously or presently furnished by the employer; or
- collecting money for an account given to the employer for collection;
- perform non-exempt work for no more than 20 percent of the hours worked in the workweek by non-exempt employees. (Exempt work includes work performed incidental to and in conjunction with the employee’s outside collections work.
- are customarily and regularly engage away from their employer’s place of business in:
- individuals working in propagating, catching, taking, harvesting, cultivating, or farming any kind of fish, shellfish, crustacean, sponge, seaweed, or other aquatic forms of animal or vegetable life, including going to and returning from work and loading and unloading the products prior to first processing;
- individuals who work on a ship or vessel and who has a Merchant Mariners Document issued by the United States Coast Guard;
- individuals working as golf caddies;
- individuals working for a nonprofit school during the time the individual is a student at the school;
- individuals working as seasonal youth camp staff members in a resident situation in a youth camp sponsored by charitable, religious, or nonprofit organizations exempt from income tax under section 501 of the federal Internal Revenue Code or in a youth camp accredited by the American Camping Association;
- individuals working as automobile salespersons primarily engaged in the selling of automobiles or trucks if employed by an automobile or truck dealer licensed under Hawaii Statute 437;
- individuals working in any position where the employer is be required to pay minimum wage and overtime under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act, except that if the minimum wage and overtime requirements of the federal Fair Labor Standards Act are lower than those set by Hawaii law, the Hawaii minimum wage and overtime rates apply.
HI Statutes 387-1; HI Admin. Rules 12-20
