Flat-rate technician time tracking software
Your service department pays techs on booked hours. The law owes them overtime and minimum wage on real clock hours. LotHours tracks both — and computes the FLSA regular rate, the overtime premium, and the minimum-wage top-up for you.
No credit card required to start. Educational information, not legal advice.
The flat-rate pay gap most shops miss
Auto-repair technicians are usually paid flat rate — a fixed dollar amount per flagged (booked) labor hour from the repair order, regardless of how long the job actually took. Book 50 flagged hours in a week at $40 an hour and the tech earns $2,000, whether they were on the clock for 40 hours or 48.
The problem: your DMS or shop “job clock” measures efficiency — flagged hours against the door — not the hours you actually owe. Federal law (the FLSA) is keyed to hours worked, not hours booked. A flat-rate tech is still owed overtime on the hours they physically worked, and their straight-time pay must clear minimum wage for every clocked hour.
Pay flagged hours only and ignore the clock, and you build silent back-pay liability every slow week and every long week. The flagged number and the clocked number are two different things — and you need both, side by side, to run payroll correctly.
How LotHours closes the gap
One platform captures both numbers and does the FLSA math — so flat-rate stays flat-rate, and compliance is automatic.
Log booked hours per RO
Techs (or your service writers) record flagged hours against each repair order. That's the pay basis — the flat-rate dollars the tech earns.
Capture real clock hours
Geofenced timecards record actual on-premise hours automatically as techs arrive and leave the lot — the basis for overtime and minimum wage.
Compute the regular rate
Each workweek, LotHours divides straight-time pay by real clock hours to derive the FLSA regular rate that drives the overtime premium.
Add the overtime premium
Flat-rate already pays straight time on every hour, so overtime is owed as a half-time premium on the regular rate (full-time on CA double-time hours).
True up minimum wage
If a slow week's flagged pay falls below minimum wage × clocked hours, LotHours adds a top-up so straight-time pay always clears the floor.
Reconcile and export
An admin reconciliation view shows flagged vs. clock hours per tech, per pay period. Exports drop straight into ADP, Paychex, Gusto, or QuickBooks.
A worked example
One technician, one workweek. Flat rate $40/hour, 50 flagged hours booked, 45 real clock hours on the geofence — 40 regular and 5 overtime.
| Flagged (booked) pay | 50 flagged hrs × $40 | $2,000.00 |
| Minimum-wage top-up | Flagged pay already clears the floor | $0.00 |
| Straight-time pay | Flagged pay + top-up | $2,000.00 |
| Regular rate | $2,000 ÷ 45 real clock hrs | $44.44/hr |
| Overtime premium | ½ × $44.44 × 5 OT hrs | $111.11 |
| Total pay | Straight-time + OT premium | $2,111.11 |
The tech keeps every flat-rate dollar they earned, plus the $111.11 overtime premium the law requires on the regular rate. Pay the flagged $2,000 alone and you'd owe that premium in back pay. LotHours computes it the same way every workweek — and resets the regular rate each week, exactly as the FLSA requires.
Want the legal basis behind this math? Read our guide: do flat-rate technicians get overtime?
What you get
- Per-tech, per-pay-period reconciliation of flagged hours vs. real clock hours.
- Automatic FLSA regular-rate, half-time overtime, and minimum-wage top-up calculations.
- California meal-period premiums priced at the week's flat-rate regular rate.
- Workweek-accurate overtime — the regular rate resets each FLSA week, never averaged across a pay period.
- Audit-ready clock events with location accuracy, battery, and timestamp on every punch.
- Payroll-ready exports formatted for ADP, Paychex, Gusto, and QuickBooks.
Pay flat rate. Stay compliant.
Capture both numbers, run the FLSA math automatically, and export payroll in minutes. 14-day Pro trial, no credit card required.
Start free trialLotHours provides general educational information and payroll calculation tools, not legal advice. Overtime and minimum-wage obligations vary by jurisdiction — confirm your pay practices with your payroll partner or employment counsel.