California and New York have some of the most peculiar, employee-friendly laws in the nation pertaining to the hours and days of work, employee working conditions, and the proper and timely compensation of employees. These “wage and hour laws,” are frequently violated by even the most honest, well-intentioned employers because they are so complicated, drawn from so many different sources, and vary from state-to-state.
Wage and Hour
For example, in California employers are required to follow the California Labor Code, which contains literally hundreds of different statutes and mandates. On top of that, a now-defunct agency known as the Industrial Welfare Commission (“IWC”) previously published 17 different “Wage Orders” that set additional wage and hour rules in different industries and occupations. These Wage Orders still have the force of law, so a California employer has to know about and comply with these, too. There’s also the regulations and opinion letters issued by the California Division of Labor Standards Enforcement (“DLSE”) and the California Labor Commissioner, all of which must be complied with as well. And, if that weren’t enough, there’s also a federal wage and hour law – known as the Fair Labor Standards Act (“FLSA”) – that California employers must also follow, in addition to wage and hour laws imposed at the city and county level.
With appellate courts across the state issuing binding decisions on a daily basis that interpret and sometimes change all these incoming wage and hour laws, the result is a dizzying maze of complex, overlapping, and often conflicting employer mandates and employee rights. No wonder wage and hour litigation against employers has exploded in the last decade, particularly in the aftermath of COVID-19. With so many employers now allowing their employees to work from so many different locations, including remotely from different cities and states, employers now confront wage and hour obligations and liabilities in multiple cities, counties, and states – often without even realizing it.
How Workplace Legal Can Help
Workplace Legal’s Employment Litigation & Trials practice defends employers from all types of wage and hour claims in state and federal courts and before the U. S. Department of Labor. Our Labor Commissioner Proceedings practice defends employers before the California Labor Commissioner’s office on wage and hour claims involving PAGA penalties, unlawful pay practices, off-the-clock work, failure to pay minimum wage and/or overtime, improper worker classification (exempt vs. non-exempt, employee vs. independent contractor), failure to provide meal and/or rest periods, unlawful payroll recordkeeping, and failure to pay timely wages to terminated employees, and among others.
In addition, our Counseling & Preventive Advice practice works with employers to develop and rollout compliant payroll practices, policies, and procedures – including proper overtime policies, exempt vs. non-exempt employee classification procedures, meal and rest period policies, paid sick leave policies, expense reimbursement policies, and proper pay stubs, among other things. In this counseling role, Workplace Legal helps its clients avoid wage and hour liability entirely by ensuring that all of the client’s pay practices and policies are compliant with each and every local, state, and federal wage and hour law applicable to the client’s business.
Workplace Legal’s HR Infrastructure, Audits & Strategy practice similarly helps clients avoid wage and hour liability by (a) identifying non-compliant pay practices and policies, (b) counseling clients on their options for new, compliant pay policies going forward, (c) creating formal, written policy documents, handbooks, and manuals that explain the client’s new pay policies going forward, and (d) guiding the client through the internal marketing and rollout of their new state-of-the-art HR infrastructures.
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