Unless you’re an employee who is exempted, California law requires employees who work more than five hours in a day to be given the opportunity for a minimum of a 30-minute unpaid meal break each working day pursuant to section 512 of the California Labor Code. If an employee isn’t working more than six hours in a day, he or she can option out of a meal break. If an employee is working more than 10 hours in a day, a second 30-minute meal break must be given, but for a 12-hour day, the second meal break can be optioned out of so long as the employee took the first meal break.
What Employees are Exempt from Meal Breaks?
Only a handful of employees are legally exempt from meal breaks. Those individuals include employees who spend more than half of their time in managerial, administrative, executive or professional jobs. They must have wide-ranging judgment and discretion in their jobs and must earn at least twice the California minimum wage required of full-time employers. Union employees under collective bargaining agreements aren’t protected by section 512 either. Protected employees cannot be designated as “on call” or be required to forfeit their meal break if work gets busier than normal either.
When an employer denies or interferes with employee meal breaks, individual or class action lawsuits can be brought against it. The Private Attorney General Act might even be used to bring a class action on behalf of a group of employees. By using that, the employer can be held responsible for the employees’ costs, legal fees along with civil penalties. If you have questions or issues with your employer’s break rules, contact us for a consultation with a dedicated and effective California employment lawyer.
Contact our California Labor and Employment Lawyers today.
