When you own a business with employees, you want to make sure that you comply with all the requirements of California’s employment law and that you didn’t leave any important matter behind. The most current overlooked issues within the workplace seem to be breaks, lunch breaks and overtime.
Regarding overtime, most federal and state laws require employers to pay overtime, which usually represents an additional 50% of the employee’s hourly wage. That means that if the employee works one-hour overtime, she should be paid “one hour and a half”.
Unlike overtime, federal laws do not require meal breaks or rest breaks even if many employers do seem to satisfy this common practice. However, some states do require those breaks. In the state of California, a ½ hour meal break is required after 5 hours of work except when the workday will be completed in six hours or less and only if there is a mutual consent to waive this meal period. A second meal period of not less than thirty minutes is required if an employee works more than ten hours per day, except that if the total hours worked is no more than 12 hours, the second meal period may be waived by mutual consent of the employer and employee only if the first meal period was not waived. If the employer requires the employee to remain at the work site or facility during the meal period, the meal period must be paid.
Employers of California employees covered by the rest period provisions of the Industrial Welfare Commission Wage Orders must authorize and permit a net 10-minute paid rest period for every four hours worked or major fraction thereof. Working through your rest period does not entitle you to leave work early or arrive late. Your employer can require that you stay on the premises during your rest break.
A rest period is not required for employees whose total daily work time is less than three and one-half hours. Pursuant to Labor Code Section 1030 every employer, including the state and any political subdivision, must provide a reasonable amount of break time to accommodate an employee desiring to express breast milk for the employee’s infant child. The break time shall, if possible, run concurrently with any break time already provided to the employee. The employer shall make reasonable efforts to provide the employee with the use of a room or other location, other than a toilet stall, in close proximity to the employee’s work area, for the employee to express milk in private. The room or location may include the place where the employee normally works if it otherwise meets the requirements of this section. An employer is not required to provide an employee break time for purposes of lactating if to do so would seriously disrupt the operations of the employer.
In any case, once you made sure that you have fulfilled all of the employment break and meal requirements, you might want to create an employee handbook or document that explains all of your workplace policies and make sure that all the employees receive the same information.