Every so often a litigation firm will experience the tide of a wave of cases in a particular area of law. This has been the situation with labor violation claims over the last five to ten years. Many of our business clients have been experiencing claims filed against their companies for wage and hour violations, some of which give rise to class action claims by plaintiffs or audits by the particular agency investigating the claims. In most cases, employers truly believed that they were in compliance with applicable labor codes and wage orders, they were simply confused by the requirements around meal breaks and employees who did not want to leave their desks or work project to go to lunch when required.
The recently decided Supreme Court ruling in Brinker Restaurant Corp. vs. Superior Court has changed the required duty landscape of California employers in overseeing the meals and break periods for its non-exempt employees. Previous law, under California Labor Code Section 512 and applicable wage orders as well as the prevailing case holdings, put the policing onus on employers to ensure that employees were actually away from their desks and work duties during the meal and break periods. Meal periods are the requisite thirty minutes for every five hours worked under the Labor Code. Rest periods are the requisite 10 minutes for provided every four hours worked. Prior to the Brinker ruling employers were held to daunting obligations which they had to impose on non-exempt employees, forcing them to leave their work areas and, ideally, go off-site for a meal or break period every day worked. For those employers with employees working remotely or from home, this imposed the somewhat impossible task of constant oversight and administrative tracking. Additionally, in many cases, the employee preferred to stay on site and work, forfeiting the meal break, if he or she was involved a compelling project or work assignment. So the legal requirements actually put the employer and employee at odds, when both may have desired the alternative common sense approach to a break or meal requirement.
The Brinker case clarifies and modifies the requirements under the Labor Code. The claims in the Brinker case were initially brought in 2004 by five employees against Brinker, Chili’s restaurant’s parent company, and expanded into a class action claim which had the potential of including some 63,000 past and present employees claiming meal and break violations. In April of this year, the Brinker court held that employers need only provide the employee a work free period for meals and breaks and that the employee may elect to use that time for whatever he or she prefers. There is no requirement that the employer police the employee to ensure that they leave the premises or work area. The requirement to track the use of that time is also now born by the employee, however best practices for employers would be to collect that information and store it for HR record keeping and tracking. Brinker also addressed the certification requirements for a class action claim under wage and hour violations.
So what does this mean for employers and employees — what should they be doing under the Brinker ruling? Employers should educate and train managers and its HR department on the Brinker requirements. Employers should also update handbooks, policies and procedures and manuals as well as educate its workers as to its policies, making it clear that employees have the option to take meals and breaks away from all work obligations for the requisite time period and do nothing to imply or directly discourage employees from taking a meal or break away from work duties or their work areas or to imply or state that they should work during that period of time. They should also make clear the processes by which an employee and employer mutually elect to waive such lunch or break periods (in writing, for best practices). The Brinker decision certainly takes the heavy burden off of employers to police the actions of its workforce but the impetus to care for a workforce, even a small one, is born by the employer interested in fostering a healthy work environment. Brinker just makes it easier to utilize common sense and a mature and cohesive commitment to mutual company goals and objectives.
This article and the materials on the De La Housaye & Associates ALC website are for informational purposes only and are not legal advice. This article does not create an attorney-client relationship between you and De La Housaye & Associates.
Angela and her counsel and staff offer comprehensive legal services for companies in the areas of commercial litigation, business-employment law, contracts, entity formation and mergers and acquisitions. De La Housaye & Associates (DLHA) works to provide clients the benefit of large firm comprehensive expertise with that of close personal attention. Angela has always found a strong legal value to clients in providing a combination of proactive, attentive legal support based upon the vast detailed knowledge of her clients and their businesses.
De La Housaye & Associates, A Law Corporation
Angela De La Housaye, Attorney, Founder, CEO
1655 North Main Street, Suite 260
Walnut Creek, CA 94596
Tel 925-944-3300
www.delahousayelaw.com
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