California Supreme Court Clarifies the Day of Rest Requirement

by Steve Holden

For eighty years employers have been obligated to provide employees with rest days. For eighty years it was unclear precisely what that obligation meant. Yesterday the California Supreme Court provided clarification.

In 1937 sections 551 and 552 were added to the Labor Code. Together they simply state: “Every person employed in any occupation of labor is entitled to one day’s rest therefrom in seven. No employer of labor shall cause his employees to work more than six days in seven.”  In 1941 section 556 was added and it stated that the rule from sections 551 and 552 do not apply “when the total hours of employment do not exceed 30 hours in any week or six hours in any one day thereof.”  The Labor Code also contains exceptions for certain emergency situations and permits the day-of-rest rule to be complied with by looking at a full month where the “nature of the employment reasonably requires the employee to work seven or more consecutive days.”

Because of the inherent ambiguities as the rules were written, over the past eight decades employers have complied with these rules using a variety of interpretations. Some of the questions have now been answered.

The Open Questions Addressed by the Court:

  1. Is the day of rest required by Labor Code sections 551 and 552 calculated by the workweek, or does it apply on a rolling basis to any seven-consecutive-day period?
  2. Does the Labor Code section 556 exemption for workers employed six hours or less per day apply so long as an employee works six hours or less on at least one day of the applicable week, or does it apply only when an employee works no more than six hours on each and every day of the week?
  3. What does it mean for an employer to “cause” an employee to go without a day of rest: force, coerce, pressure, schedule, encourage, reward, permit, or something else?

The Supreme Court’s Answers:

  1. A day of rest is guaranteed for each workweek. Periods of more than six consecutive days of work that stretch across more than one workweek are not per se prohibited.
  2. The exemption for employees working shifts of six hours or less applies only to those who never exceed six hours of work on any day of the workweek. If on any one day an employee works more than six hours, a day of rest must be provided during that workweek, subject to whatever other exceptions might apply.
  3. An employer causes its employee to go without a day of rest when it induces the employee to forgo rest to which he or she is entitled. An employer is not, however, forbidden from permitting or allowing an employee, fully apprised of the entitlement to rest, independently to choose not to take a day of rest.