Virginia Lunch Break and Overtime Rules/Law Virginia

[krayola]

I'm an employer, our office hours are 8:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m. (with 1 hour unpaid lunch) Mon - Fri (a 40 hour week). Can an employee opt out of lunch, or work through it, and expect 1 hour overtime for the day, providing they work 40 hours for the week? Just to clarify, an employee would work from 8-5, Mon - Fri and earn 40 regular hours and 5 overtime hours.

It seems to me that overtime hours are earned outside of normal business hours. Am I mistaken? We have also had employees that didn't take a lunch during the typical lunch hours (11-2) and wanted to leave at 4:00 for lunch, not coming back to work.

Thanks for your help in clearing this issue up.

[ScottB]

I'm an employer, our office hours are 8:00 a.m. - 5:00 p.m. (with 1 hour unpaid lunch) Mon - Fri (a 40 hour week). Can an employee opt out of lunch, or work through it, and expect 1 hour overtime for the day, providing they work 40 hours for the week? Just to clarify, an employee would work from 8-5, Mon - Fri and earn 40 regular hours and 5 overtime hours.

If the employee works mor than 40 hours in a work week, you have no choice but to pay the overtime on the hours worked over 40.

You do not have to allow that to happen, though.

It seems to me that overtime hours are earned outside of normal business hours. Am I mistaken?

Yes. In most states, overtime takes place only when an employee works more than 40 hours in a work week. Normal business hours are irrelevant. An employee could work on Monday from 7 AM to midnight and get no overtime at all (at least in my state and yours), even though most of the hours were outside the normal work day. Let's say that same employee put in 40 hours from Monday through Thursday. On Friday (still part of the same work week), he works four hours from 7 AM to 11 AM. These hours are part of the normal work day, but are all overtime.

We have also had employees that didn't take a lunch during the typical lunch hours (11-2) and wanted to leave at 4:00 for lunch, not coming back to work.

I don't know your state's laws, but that would be allowed in some states and not in others. The call would be yours to make unless the state dictates when the lunch must be taken.

[cbg]

The state of Virginia does not require breaks at all. It is entirely up to the employer when, or whether, a lunch break is taken.