Work Schedule Laws in California: Shifts, Notice, and Days Off

California has no general law that sets a minimum number of hours between shifts, a minimum shift length, or a deadline for giving employees their schedules.⁠1 Instead, the state regulates work schedules mostly through pay. A nonexempt employee⁠2 is generally owed reporting time pay when sent home early, a split shift premium when the workday is broken into pieces, overtime when a day or week runs long, and one day of rest in each workweek.⁠3

Some cities and counties add more. Local “fair workweek” ordinances, like the one in the City of Los Angeles, require certain large retail employers to give employees their work schedules at least 14 days in advance.⁠4

The short answers to the most common scheduling questions can be found on the following chart:⁠5

Each of these rules has exceptions, and some employees (like minors, health care workers, and commercial drivers) have rules of their own. This article explains them in greater detail below.

How California Regulates Work Schedules

California’s wage and hour rules come from “two complementary and occasionally overlapping sources of authority”: the Labor Code, enacted by the Legislature, and the wage orders adopted by the Industrial Welfare Commission.⁠6 The wage orders are regulations that set wages, hours, and working conditions for particular industries and occupations.⁠7

Neither source tells employers when their employees may work. For the most part, an employer decides how long a shift lasts, when it starts, and how much notice to give. Long hours, for example, are expressly allowed so long as the employee is paid overtime.⁠8

What the law does instead is make certain scheduling practices more expensive. Reporting time pay, for instance, serves two purposes: it compensates employees, and it encourages employers to give proper notice and schedule carefully.⁠9

So, to understand whether a work schedule is legal, the question is usually not whether the schedule is allowed. It is what the employer owes the employee for it.

Who Is Protected

Most of California’s scheduling rules protect nonexempt employees. Several groups of workers are partly or entirely outside those rules:

• Exempt Employees. Employees who qualify for the administrative, executive, or professional exemption are not covered by the wage order provisions on overtime, reporting time pay, or split shifts.⁠10 We explain these exemptions in our article, Exempt vs. Non-Exempt Employees: Guide to California Law.
• Outside Salespersons. The wage orders do not apply to outside salespersons.⁠11
• Public Employees. Most wage order provisions do not apply to employees who work directly for the state or for a city, county, or special district.⁠12
• Family Members of the Employer. The wage orders do not apply to the employer’s parent, spouse, or child.⁠13
• Union Employees. An employee covered by a qualifying collective bargaining agreement can be excluded from the wage order’s overtime rules. By its terms, that exclusion applies to the order’s section on hours and days of work, not to its reporting time pay or split shift provisions.⁠14
• Independent Contractors. These rules protect employees, not independent contractors.⁠15 Whether a worker is an employee depends on a legal test, not on what the employer calls the worker.⁠16

Other workers are covered but have additional or different rules. These include minors, employees in the health care industry, and commercial drivers. Their rules are discussed in a later chapter.

Workdays and Workweeks

Nearly every scheduling rule in California is measured by the workday or the workweek. These words have specific legal meanings.

A workday is “any consecutive 24-hour period commencing at the same time each calendar day.”⁠17 A workweek is “any seven consecutive days, starting with the same calendar day each week.”⁠18

Employers are responsible for designating when the workday and the workweek begin.⁠19 A workday does not need to start at midnight, and a workweek does not need to start on Sunday or Monday. But once chosen, the starting point must stay consistent. According to the Labor Commissioner, an employer may change it only if the change is intended to be permanent.⁠20

Knowing how the employer has designated the workday and workweek is often the first step in deciding what an employee is owed, because:

• Daily overtime is based on the hours worked in a single workday.⁠21
• Weekly overtime and seventh-day premium pay are based on the workweek.⁠22
• The right to a day of rest is measured by the workweek, not by any rolling seven-day period.⁠23
• Reporting time pay and split shift premiums are both calculated one workday at a time.⁠24

Time Between Shifts

Many employees are asked to close late at night and open again early the next morning, a practice sometimes called a clopening. Others are sent home in the middle of the day and told to come back for a second shift. Whether that is legal depends on where the employee works and what kind of work they do.

The General Rule: No Minimum Rest Between Shifts

For most adult employees, California law does not require any minimum amount of time off between the end of one shift and the start of the next.⁠25 Federal law does not require it either.⁠26

That means an employer can usually schedule an employee to close at midnight and open at 6:00 a.m. without violating the law.

It also means there is no “eight-hour rule.” A common belief is that an employee who returns to work less than eight hours after their last shift must be paid overtime or double time. That is not the law in California. Overtime depends on the number of hours worked in a workday or workweek, not on how much time passed between shifts.⁠27

When Back-to-Back Shifts Cost the Employer More

Although short turnarounds are usually legal, they often trigger extra pay. This can happen in several ways:

• Daily Overtime. If both shifts fall in the same workday, their hours are added together. Any time over eight hours must be paid at time-and-a-half, and any time over 12 hours must be paid at double time.⁠28
• Weekly Overtime. Extra shifts count toward the 40-hour weekly limit, after which overtime is owed.⁠29
• Split Shift Premium. If the employer schedules two shifts in one workday with an unpaid gap between them (other than a meal break), the employee may be owed a split shift premium.⁠30
• Reporting Time Pay. If the employee is required to report a second time in the same workday and is given less than two hours of work, the employee must be paid for two hours.⁠31

Each of these rules is discussed in its own chapter below.

Exceptions: Workers Who Must Get Rest Between Shifts

Some employees do have a right to a minimum amount of time off between periods of work. These include:

• Health Care Employees on 12-Hour Shifts. Health care employees who work 12-hour shifts under an alternative workweek schedule generally cannot be required to work more than 12 hours in a 24-hour period, unless a health care emergency has been declared. They cannot be required to work more than 16 hours in a 24-hour period without their voluntary agreement. And an employee who has worked 24 consecutive hours must receive at least eight consecutive hours off duty.⁠32
• Live-In Household Employees. A live-in household employee must have “at least twelve (12) consecutive hours free of duty” during each workday. If the employee is required or permitted to work during those hours, the work must be paid at time-and-a-half.⁠33
• Commercial Drivers. Under federal hours-of-service rules, drivers of property-carrying commercial vehicles generally may not drive without first taking 10 consecutive hours off duty. For drivers of passenger-carrying vehicles, the requirement is eight consecutive hours. These rules are subject to exceptions.⁠34 California has its own hours-of-service regulations for drivers as well.⁠35
• Minors. Minors are barred from working overnight. In general, 16- and 17-year-olds may not work before 5:00 a.m. or after 10:00 p.m. on an evening before a school day (or after 12:30 a.m. on an evening before a nonschool day).⁠36 Minors who are 15 or younger may not work before 7:00 a.m. or after 7:00 p.m. (or after 9:00 p.m. from June 1 through Labor Day).⁠37

In addition, some local governments have passed ordinances that require rest between shifts for certain employers:

These ordinances apply only to certain employers. The details of who is covered, along with the other rights these ordinances provide, are discussed in the chapter on schedule changes below.

Finally, an employer’s own policies or a union contract can provide for rest between shifts even where the law does not. Employees should check their handbook or collective bargaining agreement to see whether additional protections apply.

Shift Length and Maximum Hours

California does not set a minimum or maximum length for most work shifts. An employer can generally schedule a one-hour shift or a 14-hour shift. What changes is how much the employer has to pay for it, and whether the employee can say no.

No Minimum Shift Length

No California law requires a shift to last a minimum number of hours. The Labor Commissioner has recognized, for example, that an employer can schedule a relief cashier to work only a one-hour shift in the middle of the day.⁠42

Many employees have heard that there is a “two-hour minimum” or a “four-hour minimum” for shifts. There isn’t. Those numbers come from California’s reporting time pay rule, which applies only when an employee reports for work and is given less than half of the usual or scheduled day’s work.⁠43 In that case, the employee is owed between two and four hours of pay. That rule is explained in its own chapter below.

One other rule sets a floor. When employees have adopted an alternative workweek schedule (discussed below), the schedule must provide for at least four hours of work in any shift.⁠44

No Daily Maximum for Most Adults

There is also no general limit on how many hours an adult employee can work in a day. Instead, the law requires nonexempt employees to be paid more as the hours add up:⁠45

California’s daily overtime rule is more generous than federal law, which requires overtime only after 40 hours in a week.⁠46

A few related rules are worth knowing:

• Unauthorized Overtime Must Be Paid. An employer must pay for all overtime it knew or should have known about, even if the overtime was not approved in advance. The employer can discipline an employee for violating an overtime policy, but it cannot refuse to pay for the work.⁠47
• Overtime Cannot Be Waived. An employee is owed overtime even if the employee agreed to work without it.⁠48
• Long Shifts Mean More Breaks. A shift of more than ten hours generally comes with a second meal break and a third rest period. Those rules are summarized in the next chapter.
• Minors Have Hard Limits. Unlike adults, minors generally cannot work more than eight hours in a day.⁠49

If you would like to learn more about how overtime is calculated, please see our articles, Overtime Wage Laws in California and Overtime Wage Calculator for California Employees.

Mandatory Overtime

In most cases, an employer can require its employees to work overtime. According to the Labor Commissioner, an employer may generally dictate an employee’s schedule and hours, and may discipline an employee “up to and including termination” for refusing to work scheduled overtime.⁠50

There are, however, several limits on that power:

• The Seventh Day. An employer cannot discipline an employee for refusing to work a seventh day in a workweek, and it may not cause or induce an employee to give up a day of rest.⁠51 This rule is explained in the chapter on days off below.
• The 72-Hour Rule. Some employees cannot be disciplined for refusing to work more than 72 hours in a workweek. This rule is discussed in the next section.
• Health Care Employees. Health care employees who work 12-hour shifts under an alternative workweek schedule generally cannot be required to work beyond those 12 hours unless a health care emergency has been declared.⁠52
• Minors. An employer cannot require a minor to work more hours than the law allows.⁠53
• Protected Reasons. An employer’s power to require overtime is also limited by laws on discrimination, reasonable accommodation, retaliation, and protected time off. Those limits are discussed in a later chapter.

The 72-Hour Rule

Some wage orders give employees the right to refuse extreme hours. Under Wage Order 4, which covers professional, technical, clerical, mechanical, and similar occupations, an employee cannot be fired or otherwise disciplined for refusing to work more than 72 hours in a workweek.⁠54

The only exception is for an emergency, which means an unpredictable or unavoidable event that requires immediate action.⁠55 A busy season or a staffing shortage that the employer could have planned for is unlikely to qualify.

This rule gives the employee a right to refuse. It is not a cap on hours. An employee who is willing to work more than 72 hours in a week may do so, and must be paid overtime for it.

This protection does not appear in every wage order. Wage Order 7, which covers retail stores, does not contain it.⁠56 Employees can find the wage order that covers their job on the Department of Industrial Relations website.

Alternative Workweek Schedules

The eight-hour day can be changed by a vote of the employees. Under an alternative workweek schedule, employees may work up to ten hours per day within a 40-hour workweek without being paid daily overtime.⁠57 The most common example is a schedule of four ten-hour days.

An employer cannot adopt an alternative workweek schedule on its own. Among other requirements:

• The employer must propose the schedule in a written agreement.⁠58
• Before the vote, the employer must disclose in writing how the schedule will affect the employees’ wages, hours, and benefits, and must hold a meeting at least 14 days before the vote to discuss it.⁠59
• The schedule must be approved in a secret ballot election by at least two-thirds of the affected employees in the work unit.⁠60
• The employer must report the results of the election to the state within 30 days.⁠61
• Employees cannot be required to work the new hours for at least 30 days after the results are announced.⁠62

An informal arrangement does not meet these requirements. If an employer simply asks its employees to work four ten-hour days without a valid election, daily overtime is still owed for the ninth and tenth hours of each day.⁠63

Even under a valid alternative workweek schedule, overtime does not disappear. Work beyond the scheduled hours is paid at time-and-a-half, and work beyond 12 hours in a day is paid at double time.⁠64

Employees also keep certain protections once a schedule is adopted:

• The employer must make a reasonable effort to find a schedule of eight hours or less per day for an employee who was eligible to vote in the election and is unable to work the new schedule.⁠65
• The employer must explore reasonable ways to accommodate an employee whose religious belief or observance conflicts with the schedule.⁠66
• The employees can repeal the schedule. If one-third of the affected employees petition for it, a new secret ballot election must be held, and a two-thirds vote will reverse the schedule.⁠67

Special rules apply in the health care industry, where an alternative workweek schedule can include workdays of up to 12 hours.⁠68

Makeup Time

California law also lets an employee trade hours within a week without triggering daily overtime. This is called makeup time.

If an employee asks in writing to make up work time that was lost (or will be lost) because of a personal obligation, and the employer approves, the makeup hours do not count toward daily overtime.⁠69 There are conditions:

• The time must be made up in the same workweek in which it was lost.
• The employee cannot work more than 11 hours in a day or 40 hours in the workweek without being paid overtime.
• The employee must provide a signed, written request for each occasion. For a recurring obligation, one request can cover up to four weeks.
• The employer may tell employees that makeup time is available, but it may not encourage or solicit them to request it.⁠70

Makeup time belongs to the employee. An employer that pressures employees to “request” it, in order to shift hours around without paying overtime, is violating the law.

Meal and Rest Breaks Within a Shift

A work schedule is not just a start time and an end time. In California, most nonexempt employees also have a right to rest periods and meal breaks during their shifts, and the length of the shift determines how many they get.⁠71

This chapter summarizes the rules that matter most for scheduling. For a complete explanation, please see our article, Break Laws in California: Meal Breaks & Rest Periods Made Easy.

How Many Breaks a Shift Requires

As a general rule, a nonexempt employee earns a paid ten-minute rest period for every four hours worked (or major fraction of four hours) and an unpaid 30-minute meal break after working more than five hours.⁠72 Putting those rules together:

The number of breaks depends on the hours the employee actually works, not the hours the employee was scheduled to work. An employee who is scheduled for eight hours but sent home after four is not owed a meal break (though the employee may be owed reporting time pay, as discussed in the next chapter).

Rest periods are based on the total hours worked in the day.⁠73 So an employee who works two short shifts in the same workday should add the hours together when counting rest periods.

When Breaks Must Fall in the Shift

An employer cannot satisfy these rules by putting the breaks wherever it likes. The law also regulates their timing:

• First Meal Break. An employee’s first meal break must start before the end of the fifth hour of work.⁠74
• Second Meal Break. If the employee is entitled to a second meal break, it must start before the end of the tenth hour of work.⁠75
• Rest Periods. Rest periods should fall in the middle of each work period, insofar as that is practicable. Employers must make a good faith effort to schedule them that way, but may deviate where practical considerations make it infeasible.⁠76

These timing rules often decide whether a schedule is lawful. A schedule that puts an employee’s only meal break in the seventh hour of an eight-hour shift, for example, does not comply.

Breaks Must Be Free From Work

During a meal break, the employer must relieve the employee of all duty, give up control over the employee’s activities, and allow a reasonable opportunity to take an uninterrupted 30 minutes.⁠77 The same is true of rest periods. Employers may not require employees to stay on call during a rest period.⁠78

There is a narrow exception for on-duty meal breaks. They are allowed only when the nature of the work prevents the employee from being relieved of all duty and the employee has agreed in writing to a paid, on-the-job meal period.⁠79

An employer does not have to police its employees’ breaks or force them to stop working. But it may not pressure or encourage employees to skip them.⁠80

When a Break Is Missed

When an employer fails to provide a required meal break or rest period, it owes the employee one extra hour of pay at the employee’s regular rate of compensation.⁠81 That rate includes nondiscretionary bonuses and similar payments, not just the employee’s base hourly wage.⁠82

An employee can earn up to two of these premium payments per workday: one for missed meal breaks and one for missed rest periods.⁠83

These premiums are treated as wages. If they go unpaid, they can lead to additional penalties when the employee leaves the job, as well as penalties for inaccurate wage statements.⁠84

Breaks for Other Reasons

Meal and rest breaks are not the only breaks an employer has to schedule around. Employers must also provide a reasonable amount of break time for an employee to express breast milk.⁠85 We explain those rules in our article, Lactation Break Law in California.

Some industries and occupations also have break rules that differ from the ones described here. Those are discussed in a later chapter.

Reporting Time Pay

Reporting time pay is the closest thing California has to a statewide law against last-minute schedule cuts. When a nonexempt employee reports for work as required but is sent home early, or is not put to work at all, the employer usually owes the employee between two and four hours of pay.⁠86

The rule has two purposes. It compensates employees who set aside their time and showed up expecting to work. And it gives employers a financial reason to schedule carefully and give proper notice.⁠87

Importantly, an employer does not break the law by sending an employee home early. It simply has to pay for doing so.⁠88

When an Employee Is Sent Home Early

Reporting time pay is owed when three things are true:

• The employee was required to report for work,
• The employee did report, and
• The employee was either not put to work or was given less than half of the usual or scheduled day’s work.⁠89

When that happens, the employee must be paid for half of the usual or scheduled day’s work. The amount can never be less than two hours of pay or more than four hours of pay.⁠90

Under the Labor Commissioner’s approach, the hours the employee actually worked count toward this amount. The employee is paid regular wages for the time worked, and reporting time pay makes up the difference.⁠91

When an employee has a set schedule, the schedule controls. The employee’s “usual” day matters only when there was no scheduled shift to measure against.⁠92

The employer’s reason for sending the employee home generally does not matter, unless one of the exceptions discussed below applies. According to the Labor Commissioner, for example, an employee who is sent home early because the employer is unhappy with their performance is still owed reporting time pay.⁠93

When an Employee Is Called Back the Same Day

A second rule applies when an employee is required to report for work a second time in the same workday. If the employee is given less than two hours of work on the second reporting, the employee must be paid for two hours.⁠94

Unlike the first rule, this one does not depend on how long the second shift was scheduled to last.⁠95

An employee who is called back for a second shift may also have worked a split shift, which is discussed in the next chapter.

What Counts as Reporting for Work

For decades, it was assumed that an employee “reports for work” by physically showing up. That changed in 2019, when a California Court of Appeal decided Ward v. Tilly’s, Inc.

In that case, a clothing retailer scheduled its employees for on-call shifts. Employees had to call the store two hours before each on-call shift to find out whether they were needed, and they could be disciplined if they failed to call or called late. If they were told not to come in, they were paid nothing.⁠96

The court held that this practice triggered reporting time pay. It reasoned that on-call shifts impose real costs on employees, who cannot take other jobs, schedule classes, or make plans during those shifts, while the employer pays nothing for the flexibility.⁠97

Under Ward, an employee reports for work by presenting themselves in whatever way the employer has directed.⁠98 Depending on the employer’s instructions, that can include:

• Physically appearing at the workplace at the start of a shift,
• Logging on to a computer remotely,
• Appearing at a client’s job site,
• Setting out on a trucking route, or
• Telephoning the employer before the start of a shift.⁠99

A federal appeals court has since followed Ward in a case involving a similar call-in policy.⁠100

The decision has limits, however:

• Checking a Schedule Is Not Reporting. An employer does not owe reporting time pay just because it expects its employees to find out when they are scheduled to work. What mattered in Ward was that employees were required to call at a specific time and were disciplined if they did not.⁠101
• The Employee Must Be Denied Work. An employee who calls in, is told to come to work, and then fails to show up is not owed reporting time pay.⁠102
• How Much Notice Is Enough Remains Unsettled. The court did not decide how far in advance an employer must cancel an on-call shift to avoid owing reporting time pay.⁠103

On-call and standby shifts raise other issues as well, which are discussed in a later chapter.

Scheduled Meetings and Short Shifts

Reporting time pay does not turn every short shift into a two-hour shift. If an employee is scheduled for a short period of work and works at least half of it, no reporting time pay is owed.

This issue often comes up with staff meetings. In one case, employees argued that they were owed at least two hours of pay each time they attended a mandatory meeting that lasted less than two hours. The court disagreed. The meetings were scheduled in advance, and the employees always worked at least half of the scheduled time, so they were owed wages only for the time they actually spent in the meetings.⁠104

Compare a case in which the meeting ended almost as soon as it started. An employee was asked to come to the store on his day off for a talk with his manager and was fired in a meeting that lasted about 45 seconds. His employer paid him two hours of reporting time pay, and the court held that was the minimum he was owed.⁠105

When Reporting Time Pay Is Not Owed

There are several situations in which an employee who reports for work and is sent home is not entitled to reporting time pay:

• Threats to Safety. Operations cannot begin or continue because of threats to employees or property, or because civil authorities have recommended that work not go forward.⁠106
• Utility Failures. Public utilities fail to supply electricity, water, or gas, or there is a failure in the public utilities or sewer system.⁠107
• Causes Outside the Employer’s Control. The interruption of work is caused by an act of God, such as an earthquake, or by another cause that is not within the employer’s control.⁠108
• Paid Standby. The employee is on paid standby status and is called to perform assigned work at a time other than the employee’s scheduled reporting time.⁠109
• Leaving Voluntarily. The employee leaves early by choice, for example to care for a sick child. In that case, the employer did not deprive the employee of the chance to work.⁠110

Notably, a lack of work is not on this list. Slow business and overstaffing are exactly the situations that reporting time pay was designed to address.

How Reporting Time Pay Is Paid

Reporting time pay is paid at the employee’s regular rate of pay, which cannot be less than the minimum wage.⁠111 A few other rules apply:

• It Does Not Count Toward Overtime. According to the Labor Commissioner, reporting time pay is not payment for labor performed, so those hours are not counted as hours worked when determining whether overtime is owed.⁠112
• It Is a Wage. Reporting time pay is treated as wages.⁠113 That means it must be paid on time, like other wages.
• It Can Lead to Waiting Time Penalties. If an employer fails to pay reporting time pay that is owed when the employee quits or is fired, the employee may be entitled to an additional penalty.⁠114 We explain that penalty in our article, The Waiting Time Penalty for Final Wages in California.

Employees who work in a city or county with a fair workweek ordinance may be owed additional pay when their schedules are changed at the last minute. Those ordinances are discussed in the chapter on schedule changes below.

Split Shifts

Some employers break the workday into pieces. A restaurant might schedule a server for the lunch rush, send them home for the afternoon, and bring them back for dinner. The employee’s day is tied up from morning to night, but they are paid only for the hours in between.

California law accounts for this with the split shift premium, which guarantees extra pay to lower-wage employees whose workdays are split.⁠115 Like reporting time pay, the premium both compensates employees and encourages employers to schedule with care.⁠116

What Is a Split Shift

A split shift is a work schedule that the employer breaks up with one or more unpaid, nonworking gaps, other than a legitimate rest or meal period.⁠117 The California Supreme Court has described it, in passing, as being scheduled for two nonconsecutive shifts on the same day.⁠118

According to the Labor Commissioner, a schedule is a split shift when:

• The employee’s work is interrupted by a period of unpaid time off,
• The gap is longer than a bona fide meal period,
• The gap falls within the same workday,
• The gap was established by the employer and is for the employer’s benefit, and
• The employee did not request the gap for their own convenience.⁠119

The Labor Commissioner’s example is a restaurant worker who is scheduled to work from 10:00 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. and then return at 4:00 p.m. for the dinner shift.⁠120

The Split Shift Premium

When an employee works a split shift, the employer must pay one hour’s pay at the minimum wage, in addition to the minimum wage for that workday.⁠121

The wording of that rule matters. The premium is tied to the minimum wage, not to the employee’s own rate of pay. In effect, the rule sets a floor for what an employee must earn on a day with a split shift:

If the employee’s regular pay for the day already meets or exceeds that floor, no premium is owed. If it falls short, the employer owes the difference.⁠122

According to the Labor Commissioner, the minimum wage used for this calculation is the state minimum wage or the local minimum wage, whichever is higher.⁠123

This means the premium works differently depending on how much the employee earns:

• Minimum Wage Employees. An employee who is paid the minimum wage receives the full premium: one extra hour of pay at the minimum wage for each day they work a split shift.
• Employees Paid Slightly More. An employee who is paid a little more than the minimum wage receives a partial premium. Everything they earn above the minimum wage that day is credited against it.
• Higher-Paid Employees. An employee whose pay is well above the minimum wage receives no premium at all.

The Labor Commissioner has offered its own example, using figures from an earlier year. An employee earned $12 per hour when the minimum wage was $11 per hour, and worked six hours on a split shift. The floor for that day was $77 (seven hours at $11). The employee’s regular pay was $72 (six hours at $12). The employee was owed the $5 difference.⁠124

The calculator below estimates the premium owed for a single workday.

By contrast, in the leading court case on this issue, an employee earned $10.58 per hour when the minimum wage was $6.75. For an eight-hour split shift, he was paid $84.64, far more than the $60.75 floor. He was owed nothing more.⁠125

As a rule of thumb, the premium disappears once an employee’s hourly rate exceeds the minimum wage by the following percentages:

What Is Not a Split Shift

Not every gap in a schedule counts. The following are not split shifts, or do not result in a premium:

• Meal and Rest Breaks. A bona fide meal period or rest period is not a split shift.⁠126
• Gaps the Employee Asked For. If the employee requests time off in the middle of the day for their own convenience, the schedule is not a split shift.⁠127
• Voluntarily Picking Up a Shift. An employee who works a morning shift and then chooses to pick up an extra evening shift is not owed the premium.⁠128
• Overnight Shifts. A single, continuous shift that starts in one workday and ends in the next is not a split shift. Nor is a pair of back-to-back overnight shifts, even though the employee ends one shift in the morning and starts another that night. What matters is whether the employee’s working hours were interrupted, “irrespective of the ‘workday’ established by the employer.”⁠129
• Employees Who Live at Work. The premium is not owed to an employee who resides at the place of employment.⁠130

Split Shifts and Other Pay Rules

The split shift premium is separate from the other pay rules that can apply on the same day:

• Overtime. Working a split shift does not change how overtime is calculated. Overtime depends on the total hours worked in the workday and workweek.⁠131
• Reporting Time Pay. If the second part of a split shift lasts less than two hours, the employee may be owed reporting time pay for the second reporting.⁠132
• Pay Stubs. According to the Labor Commissioner, the premium must be itemized as its own category on the employee’s wage statement. It should not be lumped in with regular wages or bonuses.⁠133
• Recordkeeping. Employers must keep time records that show split shift intervals.⁠134

A claim for unpaid split shift premiums is treated as a claim for unpaid minimum wages.⁠135 That affects the remedies available to the employee, which are discussed in the final chapter.

Days Off and Consecutive Workdays

California does not limit how many hours an adult can work in a day, but it does protect the weekend, or at least one day of it. With some exceptions, employees are entitled to one day of rest in each workweek. And when an employee works all seven days, the seventh must be paid at premium rates.

The Right to One Day of Rest

California’s day of rest laws are among its oldest worker protections. They consist of two short rules:

• Every person employed in any occupation of labor is entitled to “one day’s rest therefrom in seven.”⁠136
• No employer may cause its employees to work more than six days in seven.⁠137

For more than a century, it was unclear exactly what these rules required. In 2017, the California Supreme Court answered three basic questions about them in Mendoza v. Nordstrom, Inc.⁠138 Each of those answers is discussed below.

The Day of Rest Is Measured by the Workweek

The first question was how to count the seven days. One possibility was a rolling count, under which an employee who has worked six days in a row would always be entitled to rest on the seventh. The other was a weekly count, under which an employee is entitled to one day off somewhere in each workweek.

The Supreme Court chose the weekly count. A day of rest is guaranteed for each workweek, and a stretch of more than six consecutive workdays is not automatically prohibited if it is spread across more than one workweek.⁠139

As discussed in the first chapter, a workweek is a fixed period of seven consecutive days that starts on the same calendar day each week, and the employer decides when it begins.⁠140

The practical effect is that an employee can lawfully be scheduled to work as many as 12 days in a row.

Exceptions to the Day of Rest

The right to a day of rest is not absolute. It does not apply in the following situations:

• Part-Time Schedules. The day of rest laws do not apply when the employee’s total hours do not exceed 30 hours in the week or six hours in any one day.⁠141 The Supreme Court has held that the six-hour condition is met only if the employee never works more than six hours on any day of the workweek. One shorter day is not enough.⁠142 The wage orders describe the exception as applying when the employee’s weekly hours do not exceed 30 and the daily hours do not exceed six.⁠143
• Emergencies. The laws do not apply in cases of emergency, or to work performed to protect life or property from loss or destruction.⁠144
• Railroads. The laws do not apply to common carriers engaged in or connected with the movement of trains.⁠145
• Accumulated Days of Rest. When the nature of the job reasonably requires an employee to work seven or more consecutive days, days of rest can be accumulated, so long as the employee receives the equivalent of one day’s rest in seven during each calendar month.⁠146
• Hardship Exemptions. The Labor Commissioner may exempt an employer or its employees from the day of rest laws when hardship would otherwise result.⁠147

Live-in household employees have a stronger rule. They generally cannot be required to work more than five days in a workweek without a day off of at least 24 consecutive hours, except in an emergency.⁠148

Choosing to Work a Seventh Day

The day of rest belongs to the employee, and the employee can choose not to take it.

The law prohibits an employer from causing an employee to work more than six days in seven. According to the Supreme Court, an employer causes its employee to go without a day of rest when it induces the employee to give up rest to which they are entitled. But an employer is not forbidden from allowing an employee, who has been fully informed of the right to rest, to independently choose to work.⁠149

That leaves employers with two duties:

• The employer must tell its employees about their right to a day of rest, and may not conceal it.
• The employer must stay neutral about whether the employee uses that right. It may not encourage, pressure, or reward employees to give up their rest.⁠150

Paying the overtime the law requires for a seventh day does not count as an improper inducement.⁠151

It follows that an employee can say no. According to the Labor Commissioner, an employer cannot discipline an employee for refusing to work on the seventh day of a workweek.⁠152

Six-Day Workweeks and Overtime

In California, working a six-day workweek does not, by itself, entitle an employee to overtime. Whether overtime is owed depends on the number of hours worked, not the number of days.⁠153

Overtime refers to increased hourly rates that nonexempt employees can earn when they work more than a certain number of hours in a workday or workweek.⁠154 In California, employees are generally entitled to overtime only if they work:

• More than 8 hours in a workday,
• More than 40 non-overtime hours in a workweek, or
• A seventh consecutive day in any workweek.⁠155

So, if an employee works six days during a single workweek but never works more than eight hours in a single day and never accumulates more than 40 hours of work during the workweek, they are not entitled to overtime in California.

Seven-Day Workweeks and Overtime

The rules change when an employee works all seven days of a workweek. For the seventh consecutive day of work in a workweek, the employee must be paid:

• Time-and-a-half for the first eight hours worked that day, and
• Double time for all hours worked beyond eight that day.⁠156

This premium is owed even if the employee chose to work the seventh day.

Like the day of rest itself, the seventh-day premium is measured by the workweek. It applies only when the employee works every day of the employer’s established workweek, not whenever the employee works seven days in a row.⁠157

Because so much depends on it, knowing how the employer has designated the workweek is often the first step in deciding whether overtime is owed.

There are exceptions and caveats to these rules, and some industries and jobs have overtime rules of their own. If you would like to learn more, please see our article, Overtime Wage Laws in California.

Consequences for Employers

An employer that violates the day of rest laws can face more than a bill for overtime. A violation is a misdemeanor, and it can result in civil penalties of $50 per employee for each pay period for an initial violation and $100 per employee for each pay period for later violations.⁠158 How employees can enforce these rights is discussed in the final chapter.

On-Call and Standby Shifts

An on-call shift (sometimes called a standby shift) is a period when an employee is not actively working but has to be available to work if the employer needs them. California has no statute devoted to on-call scheduling. Instead, on-call shifts are governed by the same rules that apply to all work time, and those rules answer three questions:

• Does the employee have to be paid for the time spent waiting?
• What is the employee owed if they are called in to work?
• What is the employee owed if they are told they aren’t needed?

When On-Call Time Must Be Paid

Nonexempt employees must be paid for all of their hours worked. That term includes more than time spent performing tasks. It covers all the time during which the employee is subject to the employer’s control.⁠159

Waiting can meet that definition. Whether on-call time must be paid depends on how much control the employer exercises over the employee during it.⁠160

When the employee is required to stay at the workplace, the answer is usually simple. According to the Labor Commissioner, on-call time spent at the work site is hours worked, even if the employee does nothing but wait for something to happen.⁠161

In Mendiola v. CPS Security Solutions, Inc., for example, security guards were required to live in trailers at the construction sites they guarded and to remain there during their on-call hours. The California Supreme Court held that those on-call hours had to be paid, including the hours the guards spent sleeping.⁠162

When the employee is allowed to leave the workplace, the answer depends on the restrictions the employer places on the employee’s time. Courts consider these factors:

• Whether the employee is required to live on the employer’s premises,
• Whether there are excessive geographic restrictions on the employee’s movements,
• Whether the frequency of calls is unduly restrictive,
• Whether a fixed time limit for responding is unduly restrictive,
• Whether the employee can easily trade on-call responsibilities with a coworker,
• Whether the use of a pager or phone could ease the restrictions, and
• Whether the employee actually engaged in personal activities during the on-call time.⁠163

Courts also ask whether the waiting time is spent primarily for the benefit of the employer and its business.⁠164

If the restrictions are heavy enough that the employee cannot effectively use the time for their own purposes, the on-call time is hours worked and must be paid. This is sometimes called controlled standby. If the employee is mostly free to live their life and simply has to answer the phone, the waiting time is usually unpaid. This is sometimes called uncontrolled standby.

Even on an unpaid on-call shift, the time an employee actually spends working is always paid. That includes time spent responding to calls remotely.⁠165

How Paid On-Call Time Counts

On-call time that qualifies as hours worked is treated like any other work time. Each hour must be paid at no less than the minimum wage,⁠166 and the hours count toward daily and weekly overtime.⁠167

These rules apply to nonexempt employees. An exempt employee generally does not have to be paid anything beyond their regular salary for on-call time, unless the employer has agreed to pay extra for it.⁠168

Being Called In to Work

When an on-call employee is called in, they must be paid for the time they work. The reporting time pay rules can add to that amount:

• Unpaid Standby. If an employee on unpaid standby is called in and then given little or no work, the reporting time pay rules apply.⁠169
• Second Call-In. If an employee is required to report to work a second time in the same workday and is given less than two hours of work, they must be paid for two hours at their regular rate.⁠170
• Paid Standby. The reporting time pay rules do not apply to an employee on paid standby who is called to perform assigned work at a time other than their scheduled reporting time.⁠171 That employee is already being paid for the waiting time.

Call-In Shifts

Some employers, particularly in retail, schedule employees for call-in shifts. The employee is required to contact the employer shortly before a tentative shift to find out whether they will actually work it. If not, the employee has kept the time open for nothing.

In Ward v. Tilly’s, Inc., a California court of appeal held that this practice triggers reporting time pay. Employees who were required to call their stores two hours before an on-call shift had “reported for work” by making the call, even though they never went to the store.⁠172 An employee who calls in as required and is told not to come to work is therefore owed reporting time pay.

The decision has limits. It addressed the specific call-in system before the court, and it did not decide how much advance notice an employer must give to avoid owing reporting time pay.⁠173 A federal court of appeals has since followed it.⁠174

Some cities go further. In the City of Los Angeles, for example, large retail employers must pay covered employees for a portion of an on-call shift when the employee is not called in to work.⁠175 Local scheduling laws are discussed in the next chapter.

Breaks During On-Call Shifts

Being on call and being on a break are not compatible. During a rest break, the employer must relieve the employee of all duties and give up control over how the employee spends the time. An employer cannot require employees to remain on call during their rest breaks.⁠176

So an employee who is required to carry a radio or phone and respond during a rest break has not received a compliant break, and is owed one additional hour of pay at their regular rate of compensation for that workday.⁠177

Schedule Changes and Advance Notice

Few things disrupt an employee’s life like a schedule that changes without warning. Whether the law does anything about it depends almost entirely on where in California the employee works.

No Statewide Advance Notice Requirement

California has no statewide law requiring employers to give employees advance notice of their work schedules. An employer can generally post a schedule a few days ahead, change it afterward, or cancel a shift the night before, without owing the employee anything for the inconvenience.⁠178

Statewide law steps in only at the edges of this problem:

• Reporting Time Pay. An employee who reports for a scheduled shift and is sent home early, or is told not to come in after being required to call in, may be owed reporting time pay.⁠179
• Split Shift Premiums. A schedule change that breaks the workday into two parts can trigger a split shift premium.⁠180
• Unlawful Motives. A schedule change cannot be used to retaliate or discriminate against an employee, as discussed in the next chapter.

Neither of the first two rules helps an employee whose shift is canceled a day or two in advance. For that, the employee needs a local law.

Local Fair Workweek Laws

Several California cities and counties have adopted fair workweek laws (also called predictive scheduling laws). These ordinances require certain large employers to set schedules in advance and to pay employees extra when the schedule changes.

As of November 2026, at least five California jurisdictions have a law of this kind:

These laws cover employees based on where the work is performed, not where the employer is headquartered. Several of them apply to nonexempt employees who work at least two hours in a week within the city or county.

The details differ, but most of these laws share the same core protections:

• A Good Faith Estimate. At or before hiring, the employer must give the employee a written, good faith estimate of their expected schedule.
• Advance Notice. The employer must post or deliver work schedules about two weeks ahead.
• Predictability Pay. If the employer changes the schedule after the deadline, it must pay the employee extra.
• A Right to Decline. In most of these places, employees may refuse hours that were added on short notice.
• Rest Between Shifts. Some of the laws let employees decline “clopening” shifts and require premium pay if they agree to work them. This is discussed in the chapter on time between shifts.
• Offers of Additional Hours. Before hiring new workers, the employer must first offer extra hours to its existing part-time employees.
• Protection From Retaliation. The employer cannot punish an employee for using these rights.

Predictability Pay

Predictability pay is extra compensation owed to an employee when the employer changes their schedule without enough notice. It is owed in addition to wages for any time actually worked.

The amount depends on the local law, how late the change was made, and what kind of change it was:

San Francisco also requires two to four hours of pay when an employee is scheduled for an on-call shift and is not called in to work.⁠190

Each of these laws has exceptions. In San Francisco, for example, predictability pay is not owed when the employee asked for the change or traded shifts with a coworker, when another employee unexpectedly failed to show up, or when the business could not operate because of a utility failure, a natural disaster, or a threat to safety.⁠191

Enforcing Local Scheduling Laws

Fair workweek laws are enforced by local agencies, not by the California Labor Commissioner. An employee who believes their rights were violated can file a complaint with the agency for the place where they work:

• City of Los Angeles: the Office of Wage Standards.
• Los Angeles County: the Department of Consumer and Business Affairs.
• San Francisco: the Office of Labor Standards Enforcement.
• Emeryville and Berkeley: the city itself.

Local laws change more often than state laws, and new cities adopt them from time to time. Employees who work for a large retail or restaurant chain should check whether their city or county has added scheduling protections.

Limits on Scheduling Decisions

California employers have wide discretion over who works and when. Most employment is at will, and an employer does not need a good reason to change a schedule, cut hours, or assign an unpopular shift.⁠192

But an employer cannot make those decisions for an unlawful reason. A schedule is one of the easiest tools for punishing or pushing out an employee, and the law treats it accordingly.

Retaliation

An employer may not use the schedule to punish an employee for exercising a legal right. Cutting hours, taking away good shifts, and assigning shifts the employer knows the employee cannot work are all forms of adverse action when they are done for a retaliatory reason.

Among other things, an employer may not retaliate against an employee because the employee:

• Complained that they are owed unpaid wages, or filed a claim with the Labor Commissioner,⁠193
• Reported a suspected violation of the law to the government, a supervisor, or someone else at work with authority to investigate it,⁠194
• Refused to take part in an activity that would violate the law,⁠195
• Opposed discrimination or harassment, or filed a complaint about it,⁠196 or
• Used or tried to use their paid sick leave.⁠197

Timing matters. If an employer takes adverse action against an employee within 90 days of certain protected activity, such as a wage complaint, the law presumes the action was retaliatory. The employer must then show a legitimate, nonretaliatory reason for it.⁠198 An employer that retaliates can also be ordered to pay a civil penalty of up to $10,000 per employee for each violation, awarded to the employee.⁠199

The local fair workweek laws discussed in the previous chapter contain their own protections against retaliation.

Discrimination

Employers with five or more employees may not discriminate in the terms, conditions, or privileges of employment because of a protected characteristic, such as race, religion, sex, age, or disability.⁠200 Hours and shift assignments are terms and conditions of employment.

So it is unlawful, for example, to give the best shifts to younger workers because of their age, or to cut an employee’s hours upon learning that she is pregnant. To learn more, please see our article, Discrimination Law in California.

Religious Accommodation

When a work schedule conflicts with an employee’s religious belief or observance, the employer must explore reasonable ways to resolve the conflict. Those include excusing the employee from the conflicting duties, or allowing them to be performed at another time or by another person.⁠201

Protected observances include a Sabbath or other holy day, and the reasonable time needed to travel before and after a religious observance.⁠202

The employer is excused only if accommodating the employee would cause undue hardship, meaning significant difficulty or expense.⁠203

Disability and Pregnancy Accommodation

Employers must provide reasonable accommodations for an employee’s known physical or mental disability, unless doing so would cause undue hardship.⁠204 A part-time or modified work schedule is one of the accommodations the law specifically contemplates.⁠205

When an employee asks for an accommodation, the employer must engage in a timely, good faith, interactive process to find one that works.⁠206 An employer that simply refuses to discuss a schedule change needed for a medical condition is likely violating the law.

Similar protections apply to employees affected by pregnancy, childbirth, or a related medical condition.⁠207

Protected Time Off

Some absences are protected by law. An employer has to build its schedule around them and cannot penalize the employee for taking them. They include:

• Paid Sick Leave. Employees can use at least 40 hours or five days of paid sick leave per year.⁠208
• Family and Medical Leave. Eligible employees of employers with five or more employees can take up to 12 workweeks of job-protected leave in a 12-month period.⁠209
• Pregnancy Disability Leave. Employees disabled by pregnancy can take up to four months of leave.⁠210
• Jury Duty and Court Appearances. Employees can take time off to serve on a jury or to appear as a witness under a subpoena or court order.⁠211
• Crime Victims. Victims of crime can take time off to obtain a restraining order or similar relief.⁠212
• Voting. Employees who do not have enough time to vote outside of working hours can take up to two paid hours off, at the beginning or end of their shift.⁠213 To learn more, please see our article on voting leave.
• School Activities. At workplaces with 25 or more employees, parents can take up to 40 hours a year for school and child care activities.⁠214
• Bereavement. Employees who have worked at least 30 days for an employer with five or more employees can take up to five days off after the death of a family member.⁠215
• Lactation Breaks. Employers must provide reasonable break time for employees to express breast milk.⁠216

As discussed in an earlier chapter, an employee also cannot be disciplined for refusing to give up their day of rest.

Cutting Hours to Force a Resignation

Sometimes an employer does not fire an employee it wants gone. It cuts the employee’s hours until they quit.

That tactic does not necessarily protect the employer. If an employer intentionally creates or knowingly permits working conditions so intolerable that a reasonable person would feel compelled to resign, the resignation is treated as a firing. This is called a constructive discharge.⁠217

A reduction in hours is not always enough to meet that standard. But when it is, and the employer’s reason was retaliatory or discriminatory, the employee may have a claim for wrongful termination.

Workers With Different Rules

The rules described in this guide apply to most nonexempt employees in California’s private sector. Some groups of workers, however, are subject to different scheduling rules. Some get more protection. Others get less.

Exempt Employees

Exempt employees, such as salaried executives, administrators, and professionals, are excluded from most of the scheduling rules in the wage orders. They are not entitled to overtime, meal and rest breaks, reporting time pay, or split shift premiums.⁠218

The protections against retaliation and discrimination discussed in the previous chapter still apply to them.

Minors

California strictly limits when and how long employees under 18 can work. The limits depend on the minor’s age and whether school is in session:⁠219

There are exceptions for students in work experience programs and for certain kinds of work.⁠220 Minors generally also need a work permit.

Because of these limits, a minor usually cannot work a closing shift on a school night, and cannot work the long days that trigger daily overtime for adults. A minor who works more than 40 hours in a week must still be paid overtime.⁠221

Health Care Employees

Health care is one of the few industries in which California limits mandatory overtime. Health care employees can adopt alternative workweek schedules with shifts of up to 12 hours.⁠222 For employees assigned to those 12-hour shifts:

• They cannot be required to work more than 12 hours in a 24-hour period unless a health care emergency has been declared.⁠223
• They can be required to work up to 13 hours if the employee scheduled to relieve them does not show up and gave less than two hours’ notice.⁠224
• They cannot be required to work more than 16 hours in a 24-hour period unless they voluntarily agree.⁠225
• After working 24 consecutive hours, they must receive at least eight consecutive hours off duty.⁠226

Health care employees who work shifts longer than eight hours can also voluntarily waive one of their two meal periods in writing.⁠227

Commercial Drivers

Truck and bus drivers are subject to hours-of-service rules designed to keep fatigued drivers off the road. Under the federal rules:

• Drivers of property-carrying vehicles may drive up to 11 hours after 10 consecutive hours off duty, and may not drive after the 14th hour of coming on duty.⁠228
• Drivers of passenger-carrying vehicles may drive up to 10 hours after eight consecutive hours off duty, and may not drive after 15 hours on duty.⁠229

These are among the only rules that give California workers a guaranteed amount of time off between shifts.

In exchange, drivers whose hours are regulated by the federal rules, or by California’s own driver rules, are excluded from the overtime provisions of the wage orders.⁠230

Union Employees

Employees covered by a collective bargaining agreement can be excluded from California’s overtime and alternative workweek rules. The exclusion applies when the agreement expressly provides for the employees’ wages, hours, and working conditions, pays premium rates for all overtime hours, and pays a regular rate at least 30 percent above the state minimum wage.⁠231

When it applies, the agreement, not the Labor Code, defines what counts as overtime and how it is paid.⁠232

The exclusion is limited. It does not, by its terms, remove the wage order’s reporting time pay or split shift rules.⁠233 And the right to one day’s rest in seven continues to apply unless the agreement expressly provides otherwise.⁠234

Public Employees

Most of the wage orders’ protections do not apply to employees who work directly for the state, a county, a city, or a special district. That includes the wage orders’ overtime, reporting time pay, and meal and rest break rules.⁠235

Public employees’ schedules are instead governed mostly by federal overtime law, civil service rules, and their unions’ agreements with the agency.⁠236

Household Workers

Live-in household employees, such as live-in nannies and housekeepers, have scheduling protections that most workers do not:

• They must have at least 12 consecutive hours free of duty during each workday.⁠237
• They must have at least three hours free of duty during the 12-hour span of work.⁠238
• They generally cannot be required to work more than five days in a workweek without a day off of at least 24 consecutive hours.⁠239

If they work during their free hours or on their days off, they are owed premium pay.⁠240

Agricultural Workers

For decades, farmworkers were excluded from most of California’s working-hours laws. That has changed. Since 2017, agricultural workers have been covered by the Labor Code’s working-hours protections, including the right to a day of rest.⁠241

Their overtime rights were phased in over several years. As of January 1, 2025, agricultural workers at employers of every size are entitled to overtime after eight hours in a day or 40 hours in a week.⁠242

Recovering Unpaid Scheduling Pay

Most of the scheduling rules in this guide are enforced with money. When an employer breaks one, the employee is usually owed additional pay: overtime, a meal or rest break premium, reporting time pay, a split shift premium, wages for on-call time, or predictability pay under a local law.

Under state law, these payments are wages.⁠243 An employee who was not paid them can recover them, often with penalties on top.

What Employees Can Recover

Depending on the violation, an employee may be entitled to:

• The Unpaid Wages. This includes any overtime, premiums, and other pay that should have been paid, with interest.⁠244
• Waiting Time Penalties. If the employee has quit or been fired and the employer willfully failed to pay everything owed, the employee’s daily wages continue as a penalty for up to 30 days.⁠245 An employer that had a good faith dispute about whether the wages were owed is not liable for this penalty.⁠246
• Wage Statement Penalties. If the employer knowingly and intentionally left wages off the employee’s pay stubs, the employee can recover the greater of their actual damages or $50 for the first violation and $100 for each later one, up to $4,000.⁠247 This penalty is also unavailable if the employer reasonably and in good faith believed its wage statements were correct.⁠248
• Attorney’s Fees. An employee who wins a claim for unpaid overtime or minimum wages can recover their attorney’s fees and costs.⁠249 Fees are also available in other actions for unpaid wages, and an employer that wins can recover its fees only if the employee sued in bad faith.⁠250

Gathering Records

Scheduling claims are won with records. Before taking action, employees should collect what they can:

• Posted schedules, and any photos or screenshots of them,
• Texts, emails, and app notifications changing or canceling shifts,
• Pay stubs, and
• Their own notes of when they actually started and stopped working.

The employer’s records matter too. Employers must keep time records showing when each employee begins and ends each work period, including meal periods and split shift intervals.⁠251 Employees have a right to inspect or copy their payroll records, and the employer must comply within 21 days of a request.⁠252 To learn more, please see our sample records request.

Raising the Issue With the Employer

Many scheduling violations are mistakes, and some employers will fix them when asked. A short written message to a manager or the payroll department, identifying the dates and the pay that is missing, is often the fastest way to get paid.

An employer may not retaliate against an employee for complaining that they are owed wages.⁠253

Filing a Wage Claim

If the employer does not correct the problem, the employee can file a wage claim with the California Labor Commissioner. A claim can be filed online, by email, by mail, or in person, and there is no filing fee.⁠254

The Labor Commissioner will usually schedule a settlement conference. If the claim does not settle, it is decided at an informal hearing, and either side can appeal the decision to the superior court.⁠255

Filing a Lawsuit

Employees can also sue in court, either individually or, when many employees were affected by the same practice, as a class action.

In addition, the Private Attorneys General Act (often called “PAGA”) allows an employee to sue for civil penalties on behalf of the state for Labor Code violations they personally suffered. Most of the penalties recovered go to the state, and 35 percent is distributed to the affected employees.⁠256

Other Kinds of Claims

Two kinds of scheduling claims follow a different path:

• Local Fair Workweek Claims. Claims for predictability pay and other rights under a local scheduling law are filed with the local agency that enforces it.
• Discrimination and Accommodation Claims. Claims under the Fair Employment and Housing Act begin with a complaint to the Civil Rights Department, which must be filed within three years.⁠257 After receiving a right-to-sue notice, the employee has one year to file a lawsuit.⁠258

Deadlines

Every claim has a filing deadline, called a statute of limitations. The most common deadlines for scheduling claims are:

Deadlines under local fair workweek laws vary. To learn more, please see our article, Civil Lawsuit Deadlines in California.

Because each pay period has its own deadline, an employee who waits loses the oldest violations first. It is usually better to act sooner.