Section 210.110  Definitions

"Act" means Minimum Wage Law [820 ILCS 105].

"Agriculture" means farming in all of its branches and among other things includes the cultivation and tillage of the soil, dairying, the production, cultivation, growing, and harvesting of any agricultural or horticultural commodities (including commodities defined as agricultural commodities in Section 15(g) of the Agricultural Marketing Act, as amended (12 U.S.C. 1141 et seq.)), the raising of livestock, bees, fur-bearing animals, or poultry, and any practices (including forestry or lumbering operations) performed by a farmer or on a farm as an incident to or in conjunction with such farming operations, including preparation for market, delivery to storage or to market or to carriers for transportation to market, but not the operation of processing such commodities and any activities subsequent to such operation. Agriculture shall not include the cultivation, growing, harvesting, or preparation for the storage or marketing of Christmas trees, as defined in the regulations promulgated under the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, at 29 C.F.R. 780.200 - 780.209 (1994, no subsequent dates or editions), as amended at 36 FR 12084. The phrase "incident to or in conjunction with" shall not include construction by a private contractor of farm buildings on a farm.

"Aquaculture" means the controlled propagation, growth and harvest of aquatic organisms, including but not limited to fish, shellfish, mollusks, crustaceans, algae, and other aquatic plants, as defined in the Aquaculture Development Act [20 ILCS 215].

"Compliance Officer" means an authorized representative of the Director who is charged with the duty to:

investigate and gather data regarding the wages, hours and other conditions and practices of employment in any industry subject to this Act; and

investigate such facts, conditions, practices or matters as the officer may deem necessary or appropriate to determine whether any person has violated any provision of this Act, or which may aid in the enforcement of this Act.

"Department" means the Illinois Department of Labor.

"Director" means the Director of the Department or a duly authorized representative.

"Domestic worker" has the definition ascribed to it in the Domestic Workers' Bill of Rights Act [820 ILCS 182].

"Employee" means any individual permitted or suffered to work by an employer.

The Director will consider the following factors as significant when determining whether an individual is an employee or an independent contractor:

the degree of control the alleged employer exercised over the individual;

the extent to which the services rendered by the individual are an integral part of the alleged employer's business;

the extent of the relative investments of the individual and alleged employer;

the degree to which the individual's opportunity for profit and loss is determined by the alleged employer;

the permanency of the relationship;

the skill required in the claimed independent operation.

The common law standards relating to master and servant, the parties' designations and terminology, and the individual's status for tax purposes, are not dispositive. Rather, it is the total activity or situation that is controlling. In the case of an individual employed by a public agency, such term means any individual employed by the State of Illinois or any of its political subdivisions except for an individual who is a bona fide elective or appointed official.

"Governmental body" means the State and its agencies, municipalities and units of local government, and school districts.

"Hours worked" means all the time an employee is required to be on duty, or on the employer's premises, or at other prescribed places of work, and any additional time the employee is required or permitted to work for the employer. In the context of domestic work, "hours worked" includes all time during which a domestic worker is not completely relieved of all work-related duties, regardless of the location where the domestic work is performed.

An employee's meal periods and time spent on-call away from the employer's premise are compensable hours worked when such time is spent predominantly for the benefit of the employer, rather than for the employee.

An employee's travel, performed for the employer's benefit (for example, in response to an emergency call back to work outside the employee's normal work hours, or at the employer's special request to perform a particular and unusual assignment, or as a part of the employee's primary duty, or in substitution of the employee's ordinary duties during normal hours) is compensable work time as defined in 29 CFR 785.33 – 785.41 (1994, no subsequent dates or editions), as amended at 26 FR 190.

"Immediate family", as used in Section 3(d)(1) of the Act, means a person related to a subject employer either by blood, marriage or adoption and living as part of the same household. An employer who employs fewer than four employees exclusive of the employer's parent, spouse or child or other immediate family member is not subject to the provisions of the Act or this Part unless the employee is a domestic worker as defined in 820 ILCS 182/10.  The definition of "immediate family" contained in 820 ILCS 182/10 shall apply to such domestic workers.

"Including any radio or television announcer, news editor, or chief engineer, as defined by or covered by the Federal Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938", as used in Section 4a(2)(E) of the Act, means any employee employed as an announcer, news editor, or chief engineer by a radio or television station the major studio of which is located:

in a city or town of one hundred thousand population or less, according to the latest available decennial census figures as compiled by the Bureau of the Census, except where such city or town is part of a standard metropolitan statistical area, as defined and designated by the Bureau of the Budget, which has a total population in excess of 100,000; or

in a city or town of 25,000 population or less, which is part of such an area but is at least 40 airline miles from the principal city in such area, as defined in the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 (29 U.S.C. 213(b)(9)) and the regulations promulgated thereunder at 29 C.F.R. Part 793 (1995, no subsequent dates or editions), as amended at 26 FR 10275.

"Individuals whose capacity is impaired by age or physical or mental deficiency", as used in Section 5 of the Act and in Subpart E of this Part, means individuals whose earning or productive capacity are impaired by a physical or mental disability, including those relating to age or injury, for the work to be performed. Disabilities which may affect earning or productive capacity include blindness, mental illness, intellectual or developmental disability, cerebral palsy, alcoholism, and drug addiction. The following, taken by themselves, are not considered disabilities for the purposes of Section 5 of the Act and Subpart E of this Part: vocational, social, cultural, educational disabilities; chronic unemployment; receipt of welfare benefits; nonattendance at school; juvenile delinquency; and correctional parole or probation.  Further, a disability which may affect earning or productive capacity for one type of work may not affect such capacity for another.

"Learners", as used in Section 6 of the Act and Subpart F of this Part, means individuals who are participating in a training program for an occupation in which they are employed. Such a training program must involve either formal instruction or on-the-job training during a period when the learners are entrusted with limited responsibility and are under supervision or guidance.

"Man-day" means any day during which an employee performs any agricultural labor for not less than one hour.

"A member of a religious corporation or organization" means an individual whose functions are spiritual or religious, such as a priest, rabbi, minister, nun, reverend or other such individuals who perform similar functions as their primary duties.

"Student learner", as used in Section 6 of the Act and Subpart F of this Part, means a student who receives course credit for participating in school-approved work-study programs.

"Tipped employee" means an employee engaged in an occupation in which gratuities are customarily recognized as part of the remuneration of such employee as referred to in Section 4(c) of the Act; an employee cannot be deemed a tipped employee unless the employee received $20 or more per month in gratuities.

"Volunteer" means a person who works for an employer under no contract of hire, expressed or implied, and with no promise of compensation, other than reimbursement for expenses as part of the conditions for work.  A volunteer is not an employee for the purposes of this Act.

"Wages" means compensation due to an employee by reason of the employment including allowances determined by the Director in accordance with the provisions of this Act.  These allowances shall include gratuities and, when customarily furnished by a group of employers to their employees, meals, lodging and other facilities.  When the reasonable cost of these allowances is not recorded by the employer, the Director will determine the fair value of such meals, lodging or other facilities for defined classes of employees based on the average cost to the employer or groups of employers, or other appropriate measures of fair value.  Such evaluations, when applicable and pertinent, shall be used in lieu of the actual measure of cost in determining the wage paid to any employee.  In the context of domestic workers, the cost of lodging and meal credits are governed by the standards in Section 210.125(d).

(Source:  Amended at 46 Ill. Reg. 14051, effective July 19, 2022)