Q. I was hired a couple of years ago by an engineering firm as an hourly, full-time employee eligible for overtime. As such, I was paid time-and-a-half for my overtime hours, of which I worked plenty.

Awhile back, I was given a performance evaluation in which I was told my hourly rate was going up. My regular hourly rate did go up, but my first paycheck after the evaluation was actually less than the previous one, even though I worked the same number of hours.

The reason was that I was now being paid straight time for my overtime hours. When I asked about it, I was told my status had changed to straight time from the date the new hourly rate took effect, “in accordance with the company’s personnel policy.”

Nothing had ever been said to me or put in writing about my becoming a salaried employee, or that I was no longer entitled to the same overtime rate I received before. Does my employer have any legal obligation to inform me of the change in my employment status?

A. No, your employer has no legal obligation to inform you, either verbally or in writing, of a change in employment status, said John Finnigan, a Maitland, Fla., labor and employment lawyer.

Your employer does have a legal obligation to classify you correctly, Finnigan said. If your new job responsibilities mean that you are now a salaried employee exempt from federal overtime requirements, then your employer must pay you a regular weekly rate. It can pay you extra for your overtime hours, but it doesn’t have to.

But it’s also common for employers to misclassify employees as “salaried exempt,” meaning exempt from overtime, when their job responsibilities actually still entitle them to federally required overtime, which is a minimum of time-and-a-half for each overtime hour.

If you think you have been misclassified, Finnigan advises talking to your employer’s human resources department to clarify your employment status. Your other alternatives are to contact the Wage and Hour Division of the U.S. Department of Labor or a lawyer who represents employees in wage and overtime cases.

Health plan update: High-deductible health-insurance plans are becoming increasingly popular with employers, with nearly half of surveyed companies now offering them, versus just a third of all companies surveyed in 2006.

The annual health-care survey of 450 large employers collectively employing 8.4 million workers was jointly sponsored by the National Business Group on Health and the human-resources consulting firm Watson Wyatt.

The percentage of surveyed companies offering high-deductible plans has risen from 33 percent in 2006 to 39 percent last year to 47 percent this year. Next year, more than half of the surveyed companies — 54 percent — expect to offer the plans.

A big reason for the increase: While companies without these “consumer-directed” plans had health-cost increases averaging 7 percent, those with the high-deductible plans had increases of 5.5 percent. And among the latter, those that had 50 percent or higher employee-participation rates in the consumer-directed plans saw average annual health-cost increases of just 3.6 percent.

The companies with the highest participation rates combined the consumer-directed health plans with a variety of proactive programs, including health assessments, aggressive communication and financial incentives for those participating.

Harry Wessel is a reporter for The Orlando Sentinel. He can be reached at (407) 420-5506 or hwessel@orlandosentinel.com.