California Meal And Rest Periods

Learn what constitutes a meal or rest break and your obligations as an Employer under California’s employee break laws. Understand the requirements and the possible violations and penalties associated with CA meal and rest break compliance.

• Employer obligations for meal and rest breaks
• What constitutes a meal/rest break?
• No on-call rest breaks (December 2016 ruling)
• Waiver provisions
• Premium pay for meal and/or rest break violations
• How to implement policies that provide for discipline of employees for failing to track their time or failing to clock out for meal breaks
• Best practices to avoid compliance trouble

• Meal and Rest Periods – Definition
• Meal and Rest Periods Rules
• First 30-Minute Meal Break
• Second 30-Minute Meal Break
• On-Duty Meal Breaks
• Meal and Rest Period Scheduling
• Penalty for Failing to Provide Meal and Rest Breaks
• Six-Hour Meal Period Waiver
• Second Meal Period Waiver
• Responsibility to Schedule and Complete Attestation Form
• Sample California Meal and Rest Period Attestation Form
• Your Employer’s California Meal and Rest Period Policy

Under California law (which is much more generous to employees than federal law), if you are a non-exempt worker, you are entitled to meal and rest breaks: a 30-minute meal break if you work more than 5 hours in a workday, and 10 minutes breaks for every 4 hours you work. There are other requirements though.

Meal and rest break compliance continues to be the source of a great deal of litigation for California employers. Understanding California’s meal and rest breaks requirements is extremely important. To comply with these rules, employers must do everything possible to communicate the legal requirements of California’s employee break laws to nonexempt workers and provide them opportunities to take meal and rest breaks.

• Managers
• Supervisors
• Potential Managers
• Department Heads
• HR Professionals

       Teri Morning

       MBA, MS, specializes in solving company "people problems"

• Teri is the founder and President of Hindsight Human Resources.www.hindsightcloud.com.
• Teri also sources HR software solutions for incident tracking, employee relations, safety (Incident Tracker), compensation (Compease) and performance management (Performance Pro).
• Twenty+ years human resource and training experience in a variety of fields, including retail, distribution, architectural, engineering, consulting, manufacturing (union), public sector and both profit and non-profit companies.
• Teri has enjoyed consulting with employers on their problems and trained managers and employees for over 20 years, meeting and working with employees from all types of businesses.
• In addition to a MBA, Teri has a Master’s degree in Human Resource Development with a specialization in Conflict Management.
• Teri was certified by the State of Indiana in mediation skills, and Teri is currently certified in Project Management and IT Management and qualified as a Myers-Briggs practitioner. Teri has held the PHR, SPHR, SPHR-CA and SHRM-SCP certifications.