hi im new to this site. my husbund came home yesterday staving and extreemly tired. he told me that his work didnt give him any breaks and didnt let him take a lunch because they were under staffed and too busy. he came home today and told me that his boss sent him to do a setup at a clients place all day and he again didnt get any breaks and a lunch all day. his work requires him to do MANDATORY OVERTIME:eek: and im not sure if thats legal too. he works in a rental house for film equipment his job title is a Tech. can someone please tell me if there is anything we can do and if we can get some sort of compensation for this ordeal. :confused:

Do you know if your husband is an exempt or non-exempt employee? Does he get paid for overtime?

What are your husband's job duties.

Thanks.

my husbund definatly pays all taxes. he deals with rentals takes in orders and makes sure that when an order is returned its all there and goes out to put up equipment or delivers the equipment. he has the worst manager there and even the owners know that he does nothing... if he doesnt want to do something that the owner tells him to do he will threaten to fire my husbund if he doesnt do as he says. or even threaten to fire him if he doesnt take blame for something the manager did wrong.

Is he a full time employee? Does he work over 6 hours?
If so it is illegal in CA not to allow a meal break

he is definatly a full time employee he works more than 40 hours a week and works more than 8 hours a day sometimes up to 12 hours!!!

what can i do?

"You" do nothing he needs file a complaint with the proper agency to deal with this. The DOL comes to mind but cbg or another will know better. I can safely say its against the law to not allow breaks for employees working over 6 hours in the State of California

wschulte: My husband came home yesterday staving and extremely tired. He told me that his work didnt give him any breaks and didn't let him take a lunch... His work requires him to do MANDATORY OVERTIME, and I'm not sure if that's legal... Can someone please tell me if there is anything we can do and if we can get some sort of compensation for this ordeal?

From what you described, I would categorize your husband as a non-exempt employee. As such, he is generally entitled to time-and-a-half pay when he works more than 8 hours in a day and double-time when he works more than 12 hours in a day.

Your husband also is also entitled to rest breaks (10 minute, paid breaks for every four hours he works) and meal breaks (30 minute, unpaid breaks whenever he works more than 5 hours in a day. If your husband works more than 10 hours in a day, he is entitled to two (2), 30-minute meal breaks). You can read more about California's law regarding rest breaks here http://www.dir.ca.gov/dlse/FAQ_RestPeriods.htmand meal breaks here http://www.dir.ca.gov/dlse/FAQ_MealPeriods.htm

Note 1: If your husband was not provided meal or rest breaks in accordance with the law, his employer is generally going to be obligated to pay him 1 hour of penalty pay for each violation.

Note 2: If your husband's employer has not properly compensated him for overtime or meal/rest breaks, he can file a wage claim with the California Disivion of Labor Standards Enforcement (DLSE). This is the state agency chartered with the responsibilty of ensuring that employers comply with the law. You can access more information about filing a wage claim here http://www.dir.ca.gov/dlse/HowToFileWageClaim.htm

Mandatory overtime is generally not illegal.

Just as a clarification, when we ask about exempt or non-exempt in this forum we are not talking about taxes. Those terms as used here have to do with their status under the Fair Labor Standards Act and have to do with an employee's job duties and whether or not they are required to be paid overtime.

Exempt for tax purposes is a totally different animal. :)