Do I need to pay for commute time to a first client visit?

Do I need to pay for commute time when a remote worker drives from home to a first client visit

Federal wage law treats ordinary home-to-work travel as unpaid commute time. A remote worker who simply leaves home, drives to the first client, and starts the day there is normally not being paid for that drive. If the worker starts performing job duties before or during the trip, the legal answer changes.

The part people get wrong is the word remote. Working from home does not turn every trip into paid time. The key question is whether the travel is still an ordinary commute or whether the employee has already started a principal activity for the employer. The Department of Labor says ordinary home-to-work travel is a normal incident of employment, and that travel between different worksites during the workday is hours worked.

The first client visit is often still a commute. If the employee wakes up, gets in the car, and drives straight to the client, the drive is usually the same kind of travel as going to an office. The fact that the employee’s office happens to be home on other days does not by itself make the drive to the first client compensable. The inconvenient part is that the employer still has to look at what happened before the car moved.

Pay becomes required when the commute is not just a commute. The Department of Labor’s recent opinion letter on a worker who receives pages, calls clients, schedules appointments, and then drives from home to the first client appointment says the time before the drive can be work time, and the drive itself can be part of the workday when it follows required work activities. That is the point where the clock starts.

A practical test is simple: ask what the worker was required to do before arriving at the client. If the answer is nothing except getting dressed and driving, the travel is normally unpaid commute time. If the answer includes answering emails, taking calls, receiving dispatch instructions, setting up the day’s route, or otherwise doing required work, that time is more likely compensable.

The exact result also depends on state law. California, for example, has detailed rules on compensable travel and temporary work locations, and it can be more protective than federal law. If the worker is in a state with stricter rules, you have to check that state’s wage order or labor guidance, not just the federal rule.

There is one more distinction that matters: mileage reimbursement and wage payment are different issues. A drive can be unpaid as work time and still create a reimbursement question for business expenses under company policy or state law. If you are deciding payroll treatment, focus first on whether the drive is hours worked. If you are deciding expenses, check reimbursement rules separately.

A clean way to handle this in practice is to write down the start of the workday. If the remote worker’s day starts at home with a required work task, record that as the start time and pay from there. If the worker’s first work event is arrival at the client after a normal drive, treat the trip as commute time. DevConnect has a separate overview on closed-test rules at https://devconnectplatform.com, but wage and hour treatment has to stand on labor law, not platform policy.

When it goes wrong, the usual mistake is recording all first-client travel as unpaid because it began at home. That creates risk if the employee was already working before the drive. The opposite mistake also causes trouble, paying every home-to-client trip even when the worker only commuted. The safest process is to document the employee’s first required task each day, then pay only the time that law treats as work.

If you want a concrete example, compare two employees. Employee A logs in from home at 8:00 a.m., answers client messages until 8:20 a.m., then drives to a 9:00 a.m. meeting. Employee B leaves home at 8:00 a.m. with no work instructions and arrives at a 9:00 a.m. meeting. Employee A’s pre-drive time is work time, and the drive may be too. Employee B’s drive is ordinary commute time.

The safest rule is this: do not pay for the drive just because the employee is remote, and do pay for it when the employee has already begun the workday with required duties. If the facts are close, check the employee’s state law and the company’s travel policy before you set payroll practice.