The National Association for Home Care & Hospice (NAHC) recently met with the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) in an attempt to outline the industry’s concerns about the companionship exemption’s removal.
 
The pending final rule would remove minimum wage and overtime exemptions for providers of “companionship services.” The removal of this exemption would “severely harm both consumers and caregivers,” NAHC told the OMB, according to the Feb. 14 issue of the NAHC Report.
 
The OMB must clear the rule before it can be released. NAHC is concerned that the Department of Labor “has not performed the analysis necessary to determine the cost-benefits of the rule, the availability of reasonable alternatives, and the impact on state and federal spending in public programs such as Medicaid,” NAHC contended at the meeting.
 
NAHC notes that OMB officials seemed responsive to its concerns, but did not indicate whether OMB would extend its review of the rule beyond the statutory 90 days.