Trucking: DRIVERS PAY, illinois dept of labor, overtime rates

Question
i am with a trucking co in chicago. we have road drivers and local drivers. recenetly road drivers, who are paid by the mile, will now be paid by the mile, but also by the trips and ppwk they turn in for that trip. so if they turn in the ppwk, they get paid, if they don't turn it in, they dont get paid. i am the billing clerk at this company and the ppwk is my job. i have had a problem with the local drivers not turning in their ppwk, can they also be paid by the hour and then by the trip, example a city driver picks a load at 0800, delivers at 1000, if they turn in the ppwk they get paid for the 2 hours, if not then they don't get paid the 2 hours, my hr woman says there are laws against this, does this sound true, i personally don't beleive her. i tried going on to the illinois dept of labor website, couldn't find much on this, any light you can shed, thanks.

Answer
Al, any type of activity based pay requires some form of record keeping to match the work done with the pay to be processed.  So I understand the requirement that the driver turn in their ppwk in order to get paid.  Since drivers don't want to donate their time and not get paid they have every incentive to turn in the ppwk.  If they loose it or forget it's a costly lesson they probably won't repeat.  I don't think there is anything illegal about activity based pay as long as they are meeting minimum wage and overtime minimums and there is an accurate record keeping system.  I strongly caution against mixing hourly and activity based pay especially for the same driver in the same week.  While it may be legal there are always questions about overtime rates if they run mileage three days and hourly two days for a total of 50 hours but only 20 is "on the clock".
It's best to stick to one method or the other.
If you have mileage based drivers who do non-driving work you can set piece work activity pay; for example a drop & hook might be $2.50 or a 15 minute unit of detention might be $4.00.  Short haul or shuttle work might have a short haul premium that pays a set amount per leg or per turn.  The possibilities are endless based on your unique operation.

Hope this helps a little.
Jim.