Congress lets employers swap overtime pay for comp time—for five years
H.R. 2870 — Working Families Flexibility Act of 2025 · Filed by Mary Miller (R-IL) · Introduced Apr 10, 2025 · Reported out
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What it does
This bill allows private-sector employers to offer employees compensatory time off (comp time) instead of overtime pay for a 5-year period. Employees working at least 1,000 hours annually can accrue up to 160 hours of comp time at a rate of 1.5 hours per overtime hour worked, but must receive cash payment for unused time within 31 days of each year-end. The agreement must be voluntary, in writing, and not a condition of employment; employers cannot coerce employees to take comp time or use it.
Why we flagged it
The bill's operative mechanism is to permit substitution of deferred comp time for immediate overtime wages, reducing employer labor costs and deferring cash obligations. While framed as worker flexibility, the primary effect is to weaken the FLSA's overtime mandate by creating a legal alternative to wage payment.
What the text implies
- Comp time accrual creates a floating liability for employers that may never be paid if employees do not use the time before year-end; the 31-day payout window is short but the accrual period is long, creating cash-flow advantage for employers.
- The 160-hour cap (roughly 4 weeks) may incentivize employers to structure schedules to keep comp time near the ceiling, effectively capping overtime hours employees can work without triggering mandatory payout.
- Employees in industries with seasonal or variable hours may struggle to use accrued comp time before payout deadlines, forcing cash settlement and negating the flexibility benefit the bill advertises.
- The 5-year sunset creates uncertainty; employers may invest in comp-time systems only to abandon them, and employees may lose accrued time if the program expires and is not renewed.
- GAO reporting requirement (2 years + 4 annual reports) suggests Congress expects significant adoption and potential enforcement issues, but the bill provides no funding for DOL enforcement expansion.
Section numbers refer to the bill text the analysis read — linked under Primary records below.
Who it affects
While the bill includes protections against coercion and requires cash payout of unused time, it fundamentally weakens overtime protections by allowing employers to defer wage payment indefinitely through comp time accrual. Employees lose immediate cash compensation for overtime work, reducing take-home pay and financial security, and the voluntary-agreement requirement creates pressure in unequal bargaining relationships despite anti-coercion language.
Who stands to gain
- private employers (labor cost deferral and cash-flow benefit)
- industries with high overtime exposure (retail, hospitality, logistics, healthcare)
Named in the bill
Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, Department of Labor (DOL), Secretary of Labor, Government Accountability Office (GAO), private-sector employers, labor organizations
Where it stands
- Apr 10, 2025 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in House”
- Apr 10, 2025 — Referred to House Committee on Education and Workforce · Congress.gov: “Referred to the House Committee on Education and Workforce”
- Nov 20, 2025 — Markup held in committee · Congress.gov: “Committee Consideration and Mark-up Session Held”
- Nov 20, 2025 — Reported out of committee · Congress.gov: “Ordered to be Reported (Amended) by the Yeas and Nays: 19 - 15”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Money around this bill
8 lobbying clients named this bill on 15 disclosure filings across 2 quarters, Dec 2025 to Jun 2026. Those filings disclosed $8,844,963 in lobbying spend. A filing names 31 bills on average, so that figure is what each filing reported, not a share belonging to this bill.
More lobbying clients named this bill than 88% of bills with at least one filing.
Mary Miller, the sponsor, reported $145,130 in PAC receipts in the 2026 cycle.
- National Retail Federation — $3,881,000 on 2 filings
- American Hotel & Lodging Association — $1,680,000 on 2 filings
- AFL-CIO — $1,520,000 on 2 filings
- National Association of Wholesaler-distributors — $880,000 on 2 filings
- International Foodservice Distributors Association — $532,586 on 2 filings
Lobbying Disclosure Act filings through Jul 20, 2026. A filing shows who paid to lobby on a bill it names, not what changed.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the bill text published by Congress.gov (8,146 characters) on Aug 18, 2026. Section numbers in the findings refer to that text, linked below; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 16,222 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
Money — Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act filings whose specific-issue field names this bill for quarters ending Dec 2025 to Jun 2026. A filing's amount is reported whole beside the median number of bills a filing names; it is never divided across them. PAC receipts are FEC-reported contributions to the sponsor's candidate committee in the 2026 cycle.
As of — lobbying records through Jul 20, 2026 · page rendered 2026-10-20.
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