Meal break violations

The state and federal wage and labor law entitles an employee to legally take a meal or rest break while at work. The California law is one step ahead of the federal wage and hour laws, it states that all employers have to provide meal and rest breaks to their employees if they have worked for a specific number of hours. The California law not only wants meal and rest breaks for the employees during their work hours, but also wants the employers to pay the employees for some of this break time too. Any employer who does not follow the same, would be facing a meal break violation.

The California law states that all the non-exempt hourly employees must receive

• An unpaid 30-minute meal break, uninterrupted meal time after every five hours of work time.
• If the employee has only a six hour shift, he can ask for a waiver of this meal break period and work the entire shift at a go.
• A 10-minute uninterrupted rest break after every four hours of work

Some of the examples of Meal Break Violations:

• An employer asking his employees to combine their rest breaks is a violation of wage laws
• An employer who interrupts a worker during his meal break and asks him to work during his meal break period, is violating the law.
• An employer who expects his employees to sign a “meal period waiver” or who does not allow the employees from leaving the company or business premises during their meal breaks is also violating the wage and hour laws.

Penalty for Meal Break Violations:

An employer has to pay a penalty of 1-hour’s wages for each day a meal break wasn’t given, for meal break violations. If an employer does not provide the required meal breaks, California labor law authorizes the employees to collect a total of 2-days’ worth of wages for every day worked in the last 3 years.

Meal break Violations Lawyers:

An experienced meal break violations lawyer can advise you on whether you have been denied proper meal breaks by your employer. The wage and hours law is very complex, so even if you have been given a meal break each day, it may not be meeting the requirements of California law for meal breaks.

A lawyer will be able to calculate if you are eligible to receive back wages and penalties for receiving insufficient meal breaks. They can help you through the complicated process for filing a Labor Commissioner Complaint or state court action.

We at Khashan Law have handled a number of claims regarding the meal break violations. Our experienced team of lawyers will fight your employer to claim the maximum amount of wages and penalties. If you have any doubts about your rights to meal breaks under California law, call us at at (951) 461-2387 for a free, confidential consultation.