California PAGA Reform: Safeguard Your Break & Time Records
BY Andrew Fowler
Strengthen Compliance and Safeguard Operations in Light of PAGA Reform
As of July 1, 2024, the state of California has reformed its Private Attorneys General Act (PAGA), increasing the urgency for businesses to record and manage meal and rest breaks accurately. Here’s what you need to know to keep your company compliant and protected.
California labor laws set specific meal and rest breaks requirements that employers must rigorously adhere to. These regulations include detailed guidelines about the timing, length and documentation of breaks.
Employees working more than five hours must receive a 30-minute unpaid meal break, which must be uninterrupted and off-duty. If the workday exceeds 10 hours, a second meal break is required. For every four hours worked, employees must receive a 10-minute paid rest break. Unlike meal breaks, rest breaks do not require employers to record the exact start and stop times.
In addition to break requirements, California mandates premium overtime pay. After the employee has worked eight hours in a workday—or over 40 hours in a workweek—they are entitled to 1.5 times the regular pay rate. They are entitled to double the regular pay rate after exceeding 12 hours in a single workday. Employers must accurately document employees’ hours, including shift start and end times and meal breaks, to fully comply with these regulations.
The recent reform of California’s PAGA has escalated the importance of compliance. Under PAGA, employees can file lawsuits against employers for labor code violations. To safeguard your business, following California’s guidelines is essential. This means maintaining payroll and timekeeping records for at least four years. Here are some key practices your business should adopt:
- Time-keeping policy: Implement a policy that educates your employees and managers on the proper clock-in and clock-out procedures for the start of a workday, rest breaks and meal breaks.
- Accurate time tracking: Precisely document all hours worked, including daily shift start and stop times and meal break periods.
- Compliance checks: Implement regular audits of time records to verify accuracy and compliance.
- Process for reporting payroll issues: Ensure employees have been trained and have easy access to channels to report missing hours or other inaccuracies.
HCSS provides timekeeping applications designed for the construction industry that track hours worked and meal and break times. These applications also allow crew members to perform inspections and record the cost codes they worked on that day. They offer a comprehensive timecard system, crew management, auditing and reporting tools, the ability to customize attestation questions, and secure, long-term record keeping.
The evolving regulatory landscape in California, particularly after recent PAGA reforms, demands proactive compliance measures from employers and HCSS can provide industry-specific tools to track, manage and audit employee hours to help. With HCSS’s timekeeping solutions, you can focus more on your projects and less on regulatory stress.
Andrew Fowler is a senior product manager for HCSS.
Recently, J. J. Keller released a labor law poster resource to help contractors stay compliant with the myriad updates across multiple states. Learn more about that here.
Free Labor Law Poster Resource Helps Contractors Stay Compliant