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Compliance rule: Missed rest break penalty

Stay compliant with legislation relating to missed rest breaks

Written by Emma

Introduction

Under this rule, employers must authorize and permit a net 10-minute paid rest period for every four hours worked (or major fraction thereof).

If the employer does not authorize or permit a rest period, the employer shall pay the employee one hour of pay at the employee's regular rate of pay for each workday that the rest period is not provided.

The missed rest break penalty automatically identifies when a rest break has been missed and applies the extra one hour of pay to the relevant timecard.

This rule allows separate premiums for meal and rest violations:

  • 1 hour for missed meal break

  • 1 hour for missed rest break

The maximum in one workday is 2 hours of premium pay (one for each type).


Prerequisite

  1. Administrator access

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Settings > Compliance > Labor rules> Breaks > Missed rest breaks


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Rest break penalty calculations

If an employee does not take, or only partially takes, the full paid rest break they are entitled to, they will receive a missed rest break penalty.

A valid paid rest break must be at least ten minutes in duration.

The penalty applies if the employee completely misses the break or takes less than the required minimum time.

When a rest break is missed, the employee will receive one hour of pay at their regular rate. A maximum of one missed rest break penalty can be applied per day, even if multiple rest breaks are missed.

The paid or unpaid breaks configured at the top of the screen have no bearing on this rule. The missed rest break penalty is always calculated according to this rule's own logic.

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