Hy-Vee lawsuit highlights overtime risks for Dollar General managers

A June 30 lawsuit against Hy-Vee says department managers were required to work at least 45 hours a week and were not paid overtime. Hy-Vee denied the allegations.

Under the Fair Labor Standards Act, nonexempt employees generally must receive time and a half after 40 hours in a workweek, and exemption depends on actual duties and salary, not the title on a badge or payroll record. For the white-collar exemption, most employees must be paid on a salary basis of at least $684 a week and meet the duty tests. Retail and service employers also face special rules, including a commission-based Section 7(i) exemption that applies only if every statutory condition is met.

District managers and store leaders need to know how much time a salaried manager spends stocking shelves, running freight, opening registers and covering gaps versus supervising, coaching and making personnel decisions. They also need accurate time records and documentation that shows who actually has authority to hire, fire, discipline and direct work. When a company builds schedules around fixed 50-hour expectations, the payroll risk rises fast if the duties do not match the exemption.

Dollar General had 20,594 stores as of January 31, 2025 and 20,893 stores as of January 30, 2026, with a typical store staffed by a store manager, assistant store managers and several sales associates. In 2022, Amy Ingram and Tammy Buckelew resolved a misclassification dispute with Dolgencorp LLC for nearly $6,000 combined, plus more than $4,000 in legal fees and expenses. The managers had signed arbitration agreements with class and collective action waivers.

A 2006 wave of lawsuits involved about 2,500 current and former store managers who had been intentionally misclassified as executives to avoid overtime. In 2014, the company paid $8.4 million to settle allegations that managers worked 60 to 90 hours a week while doing mostly nonmanagerial work.

In 2022, Sen. Patty Murray wrote to Dollar General and Dollar Tree that the chains had long expected workers to put in long hours while being misclassified as managers to avoid overtime, and she cited median annual pay in 2020 of just $16,688 for Dollar General workers.