All employers in California must let their employees take meal breaks. If they don’t, they can get sued. Even if there is so much work that needs to be done, they’re still human beings and they need to eat. Of course, the meal breaks isn’t limited to just eating. Employees can also do other things aside from eating during the meal breaks.

Some things they can do include looking at their social media accounts and replying to their text messages. Of course, during office hours, they may be barred from looking at their mobile phones so this is also a time for them to catch up what they’ve missed. Hence, employees should be familiar with the meal breaks they have and here they are:

First Break

During the first five hours of an employee’s shift, the person is required to take an uninterrupted 30-minute break. Whenever a colleague needs the individual for work-related matters, the person can simply say she’s on break and the colleague will understand.

However, if the shift of the employee is only for six hours or less, the break may be waived off. Of course, it should be agreed on by both the employee and the employer. After all, the employee will be the one who will get hungry during the 6-hour period.

Second Break

For employees who work more than 10 hours, they must take a second 30-minute break. It must be consumed no later than the employee’s 10th hour at duty. The employee does have the option of waiving off the second break as long as she doesn’t work more than 12 hours.

The individual may want to go home earlier or she may think the second break isn’t necessary. If the employee and employer both agree to it, the second break may be waived. It may be possible the employee lives nearby, so she prefers to just go home earlier and rest.

On-Duty Meal Breaks

In very rare cases, employees can be allowed to take on-duty breaks. This would highly depend on the nature of work of the employee. For example, if the employee is always at the field, there’s no question an on-duty break is needed. Of course, it must still be agreed on by both the employee and employer.

No matter how addicted to work employees are, these breaks are mandatory. Besides, they’ll get stressed if they work for 8 hours straight. Hence, these meal breaks are for the good of the employees.

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Are you working in California and your employer gives you a meal and rest breaks? It is a surprise to many employees to realize that the federal laws do not give employees the right to have short breaks and meal breaks during the normal working hours. There are some employers who just allow their employees to have such breaks just because they are aware that fatigued employees are not productive. Therefore, the federal laws don’t allow the employers to give rest breaks to the employees. On the other hand, the state law requires the employer to give a number of paid rests and meal breaks to their employees.

The Federal Laws: Paid versus Unpaid Breaks

The federal laws require the employer to pay the employee for the hours worked including the designated breaks. If an employee has to work while on break or rest, he/she must be paid. For instance, when a receptionist has to wait for some deliveries at lunch time, he/she must be paid since he/she is working. Another good example is when a repairman has to take a meal while working. He is taking a meal while doing some repairs and this law demands that he should be paid for such a break.

Besides, the federal law demands that the employees must be paid for those short breaks lasting between five to twenty minutes. They are considered working hours and therefore, the employees must be paid.

On the other hand, the employer is not required to pay for breaks that are bonafide. These are the breaks whereby the employee is relieved of all the duties and allowed to go and rest for more about thirty minutes or more. At that time, the employee is not working and in such case, he/she should not be paid.

These rules only apply if the employer allows breaks. This is because the federal law does not force them to do so.

California Laws Allow Meal and Rest Breaks

California is a state that requires that the employees be allowed breaks and be paid for some of the time they spend on breaks. The employees are allowed meal breaks and paid rest breaks.

Meal Breaks

The California requires that the employees are given a thirty-minute meal break after working for five hours. The employer is not required to pay for this time. If the total working hours are less than six, the employee may decide to waive the meal break. Therefore, meal breaks are not paid unless the employee is required to do some work while taking meals provided by the employer. That is the California law meal periods.

Rest Breaks

The employers are required to provide a ten minutes paid break after every four working hours. They should be provided at the middle of working hours. However, employees who work for less than three and a half hours are not entitled to such breaks.

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