The NAM and 9 other associations and companies filed an amicus brief 8/18/2009 urging the California Supreme Court to uphold a lower court ruling that an employer's duty to "provide" meal periods is a duty to make meal periods available, not a duty to ensure meal periods are actually taken, and that statistical evidence concerning actual breaks is irrelevant to determining whether an employer afforded the opportunity to take a break. The statute is clear on its face that employers need to "provide" a lunch break, meaning to make it available.
Our brief warned that reversing this ruling would have negative consequences for employees: (1) employees nearing the end of a 6-hour shift would have to take a 30-minute meal period before returning to work for a few more minutes, (2) employees would be subject to discipline if they are late to clock out for a meal or early to clock in, and (3) employees would be unable to work through a meal period to end the workday 30 minutes earlier. The brief expanded upon adverse consequences in the restaurant, retail, waste management, construction, agricultural, temporary staffing and hospitality industries.
On 4/12/2012, the California Supreme Court generally upheld the lower court, ruling that (1) an employer need only provide a reasonable opportunity to take the 30-minute lunch break, not ensure that employees use it, (2) meal periods must start after no more than five hours of work, (3) rest breaks are required according to a clarified formula, and (4) a class of employees making off-the-clock claims could not be certified as a class action because there was no substantial evidence of a uniform company policy pressuring employees to work off the clock.
This California law has been the basis for thousands of class action suits involving lunch breaks, rest breaks and off-the-clock work. The court's decision is a very important new ruling to help manufacturers with employees in California to understand the requirements and to establish compliant workplace policies.