Can our nonexempt employees make up time missed by working extra hours another day without our having to pay overtime?
The HR Management & Compliance Report: How To Comply with California Wage & Hour Law, explains everything you need to know to stay in compliance with the state’s complex and ever-changing rules, laws, and regulations in this area. Coverage on bonuses, meal and rest breaks, overtime, alternative workweeks, final paychecks, and more.
Yes, under strict rules. Employees may make a written request to make up time missed because of personal obligations later in the same workweek without having to be paid overtime for working more than 8 hours in a day. However, the exemption does not apply if the employee works more than forty hours in a week or eleven hours in a day.
A signed written makeup time request must be submitted for each occasion. However, if the personal obligation is a recurring fixed event (such as two hours off on the same day each week to attend a class or go for an appointment), one request every four weeks is sufficient.
The employer may deny these requests. Also, overtime does not have to be paid to employees who make up time in advance of planned time off, but who then decide not to take the time off.
Employers may inform employees about this make-up provision but cannot encourage or solicit employees to request time off to be made up later in the week.—CELA Editors