What rest and meal breaks am I entitled to?
Before even considering the proper daily schedule for taking meal and rest breaks, a number of questions must be asked to determine whether an employee’s entitlement to them under California law even exists.

These preliminary questions include:

• Are you (or were you, during the time period in question) employed in California? Note that federal law does not address meal or rest breaks.
• Were you paid on an hourly basis, or were you improperly classified and paid as an overtime-exempt employee?
• Did the denial of meal or rest periods occur within the past four years? In California, these claims must be brought with three years and, in some cases, within four years.
• If questioning a meal period practice, did you agree, in writing, to waive your meal period?
• If you agreed, in writing, to waive your meal period, did that waiver allow you to revoke it at your discretion?
• What were your particular job duties during the time period in question?
• Did you employer seek and/or get a governmental exemption from any of these rules?

Assuming I am entitled to breaks, what is the meal break schedule in California?
The law is clear that an employer may not employ an hourly worker for a work period of more than five hours per day without providing the employee with a meal period of not less than 30 minutes. A common interpretation of this rule is that you cannot work more than five hours before getting such a break and, similarly, cannot take your meal break so early in the day that you would work more than five hours thereafter without taking such a break. As a practical matter, this means you should try to take your meal period as close to the middle of your shift (assuming an eight hour workday) as possible. However, if you work no more than six hours in a given day, the meal period may be waived by mutual consent of both the employer and employee.

Finally, if you work more than 10 hours in a day, the employer must provide you with a second meal period of not less than 30 minutes (except that, if the total hours worked is no more than 12 hours, the second meal period may be waived by mutual consent ONLY IF the first meal period was not waived).

Make sense? If not, just call us.

What is the rest break schedule in California?
California law also requires covered employees to be authorized and permitted to take rest breaks, meaning that they are entitled to a paid and uninterrupted break of net 10-minutes every four hours (or “major fraction thereof”). Notably, “major fraction thereof” has been interpreted as anything from two hours to three and one-half hours, depending on the legal source you reference.

Although you may be entitled to a rest break, you can waive that break. Also, since the employer is required to pay you for that 10-minute period (or longer period, if the employer agrees to it), it can require you to stay at the work site during that time. However, remember that you are not technically “on break” if you are also “on call.”

As you might expect, these summaries are merely overviews of the meal and rest break laws in California. For details regarding your entitlement to breaks, contact our office.

Is there a penalty if my employer refuses to let me take breaks?
While a “penalty” is not exactly what you are entitled to, you are entitled to receive one hour of pay if your employer violates the meal or rest break laws with regard to you on any given day. What’s more, since the meal and rest break laws appear in different places within the rules, our firm’s legal interpretation is that you are entitled to two hours of pay if your employer violates both (i.e., meal AND rest) break rules on any given day.

We urge you to consider that, if your employer is violating these rules on a regular basis, you may be entitled to a significant amount of back pay.