A federal judge on Tuesday temporarily blocked the Department of Labor rule that would have increased the number of workers owed overtime by raising the salary exemption under which white collar employees are owed overtime to $47,892 per year effective Dec. 1 from the current level of $23,660. The rule also calls for raising the salary level on an ongoing basis.

“This decision means that employers will not need to change their employees’ salary packages to ensure that those who were previously exempt from the right to overtime pay continue to be exempt,” according to Fiona Coombe, director of legal and regulatory research at Staffing Industry Analysts. “The DoL may appeal the decision but it seems likely that the rule will not be implemented on Dec. 1.”

Tuesday’s decision by federal Judge Amos Mazzant in Texas indefinitely enjoins the rule from taking effect and came in a court case involving more than 20 states that had opposed it.

Effects of the Department of Labor’s rule were being felt in the staffing industry. For example, some staffing firms weighed moving internal workers such as recruiters from salary to hourly and limiting overtime to meet the new rule. The rule had also been a topic discussed at the Healthcare Staffing Summit earlier this month.

The Department of Labor’s rule concerned the “white collar” exemption to overtime where employees performing executive, administrative or professional duties are exempt from overtime if they are paid on a salaried basis and receive the minimum salary of $23,660. That minimum would have gone up with the new rule to the $47,892.

“With the new salary minimums enjoined, most exemption decisions by employers will revert to the ‘salary basis’ and ‘duties’ tests, at least until the injunction is lifted or superseded by a final decision in the case or the rule is overridden by Congress,” according to George Reardon, an attorney with longtime experience in the staffing industry. “Of course, this 11^th-hour reprieve may create employee relations issues for firms that have already announced raises or other responses to the new rules.”

The court’s ruling applies nationwide to all employers, according to a statement by Nevada Attorney General Adam Paul Laxalt, who opposed the rule.

“Businesses and state and local governments across the country can breathe a sigh of relief now that this rule has been halted,” Laxalt said.

According to Staffing Industry Analysts’ Coombe, the court essentially concluded that the Department of Labor “exceeded its authority, as delegated by Congress, to make regulations to define the terms of the ‘white collar’ exemptions. By raising the minimum salary level by more than double, this test effectively supplants the duties test which is an essential element of the exemption. As such the final rule is unlawful.”

However, the National Law Review cautions that the Texas federal court in this case may not have the final word on this.