Tricky Reporting Time Pay Rules

Maria runs a landscape business. She creates a work schedule for her team every Friday, for the following week. Sometimes, due to weather or broken equipment, her employees show up for work and Maria sends them home early. Maria called CEA to see if she still owes her employees pay for a shift they didn’t complete.

And here was Maria’s answer: In California, non-exempt (hourly) employees who report to work, but are turned away early are owed a minimum amount of pay, known as reporting time pay. Reporting time pay is confusing for many employers because the rules are a bit nuanced.

First, it is important to remember that what is owed depends on whether an employee was reporting for their regularly scheduled shift or if they were reporting on a non-work day—for example, for a staff meeting or training scheduled on a day off.

Second, remember that reporting time pay should be paid at the regular rate of pay, not using the employee’s base hourly rate.

Regularly Scheduled Shifts

Employees who report for their regular shift and work less than half of their scheduled shift must be paid at least half of their scheduled hours—never less than 2 hours or more than 4 hours. (If they work more than four hours, pay them their actual time, of course).

Here’s something you may not realize—Reporting Time Pay is still required even if the employee is told to come back later and ends up working a full shift later in the day. When an employee is required to report to work a second time in any one workday, they must be paid for at least 2 hours.

Example: Employee is scheduled to work 8 hours and is sent home after 3 hours. They are owed 4 hours (one hour of reporting time pay added to the actual time worked). The one hour of reporting time pay must be paid out at the regular rate of pay.

Surprisingly, even when an employee is working an alternative workweek schedule, required reporting time pay does not need to be increased. For example, even if an employee is scheduled to work 10 hours a day, the maximum reporting time pay requirement is still 4 hours.

Non-Regular Shifts or Days Off

When an employee is called in to work on a day other than his/her normal work schedule (when there is no specified number of hours the employee is scheduled to work that day) the employee receives at least 2 hours of pay.

Note that reporting time pay issues often come up when terminating employees. Employers should keep in mind that if an employee reports to work only to process the termination paperwork on a regularly scheduled day, they will be owed reporting time pay if they do not work at least half of their shift. It must be included on the final check.

Reporting Time Pay Exceptions

Exceptions to reporting time pay include situations when:

1. Operations cannot commence due to threats to employees or property, or when recommended by civil authorities.
2. Public utilities fail to supply electricity, water, or gas or there is a failure in the public utilities, or sewer system
3. The interruption of work is caused by an Act of God or other cause that is not within the employer’s control.

Fortunately, employers do not have to pay an employee any reporting time pay when an employee voluntarily chooses to leave early.

Calling In

Employers must be careful not to trigger reporting time pay requirements by requiring their employees to call in to inquire about their work schedules. In Ward v. Tilly’s, Inc. (2019) 31 Cal.App.5th 1167, the court held that physical reporting was not required in order to fall under the reporting time pay requirements.

Triggers for reporting time pay include situations when employees:

• Present themselves for work by logging on to a computer remotely
• Appear at a client’s job site
• Set out on a trucking route
• Or as in Tilly’s, by telephoning the store 2 hours before the start of a shift to find out if they were scheduled to work that day.
  • The closer that an employee is required to call in before the start of the shift to find out if they are scheduled (i.e., night before, day of, etc.), the more likely reporting time pay will be owed.
  • In Tilly’s the court found the defendant’s system to be extremely burdensome on employees, because it required them to be available, prevented them from working other jobs or scheduling other activities, and made child-care arrangements onerous and potentially costly.

For more information, CEA members may refer to our Reporting Time Pay Fact Sheet on our HR Forms page and call us with questions at 800.399.5331.