In California: an employee worked 74 regular hours and then came in on sunday for a project. Do they qualify for overtime for the sunday?

I believe this was answered in another forum within laborlawtalk.com. But, in case you didn't see it, overtime is dependent upon the stated workweek of the employer. For example, if the employer has a Sunday through Saturday workweek, the time worked on Sunday will count toward the coming week's hours.

Let me know if you have any other questions.

our regular work week is Mon-Fri. We are closed Sat and Sun. Our pay period is as follows: whatever we worked during the 1st thru the 15th we would get paid on the 21st of that month. whatever we worked during the 16th thru 31st we would get paid on the 7th of the following month. So I am still not sure, does that employee qualify for overtime for working on a
Sunday despite that fact that they only work 35hrs for that week?

The state of California defines a workweek as, "any seven (7) consecutive days, starting with the same calendar day each week. "Workweek" is a fixed and regularly recurring period of 168 hours, seven (7) consecutive 24-hour periods." So, employers should establish a workweek. It can be any day of the week, as long as the employer is consistent. Most employers say that the workweek begins at 12:01 am Sunday and goes through Saturday midnight.

If that is true for your workplace, then the hours that a person works on Sunday would be included in hours worked for the coming week. An employer would not know if the 5 hours worked on Sunday is overtime until the end of the week. If the employee works over 40 hours that week, the extra hours would be overtime. (Of course, California also has a rule regarding overtime after 8 hours in a day.)

Let me know if you have any other questions.