Employers violating labor laws can be penalized with heavy punishments. Your employer should pay you the wages for the work done by you. In any unpaid wages lawsuit, you’ll be demanding for monetary damages that you rightfully deserve to get paid for violating the labor laws. This compensation is termed as ‘damages’ and not penalties. This is because the employees had to suffer due to the non-payment of the wages. As per the Californian laws, you should get paid for performing a job. If you’ve been a victim, you have the right to seek legal help from unpaid wage lawyers near me as they can guide you throughout the process. Besides compensating for the losses, the employers are also subjected to fines and penalties for violating labor rights. These penalties can be known as punitive damages because they are not only punished for violating laws but are also prevented from repeating the same mistake in the future.
If you believe that your minimum wage was denied or you were not paid for working overtime, it’s imperative to have a professional attorney by your side. This is because attorneys have full knowledge in handling unpaid wage lawsuits and they can suggest you with different options to settle your case. Get in touch with the best employer lawyer in Nakase Law firm as they are skilled in unpaid pages, sexual harassment, gender discrimination, racial discrimination, and wrongful termination.
Types of unpaid wages in California:
There are different ways by which employers can deliberately violate labor laws and deny wages to the employees. Usually, there are three types of labor law violations concerning unpaid wages in California.
Minimum wage violations– As per the California laws, it’s unlawful of the employers to pay their employees below the minimum wage. Employers with a smaller number of employees need to be paid The employers with a total of 25 employees will have to be paid a minimum salary of $12.00, whereas employers having a larger number of employees i.e. 26 or more employees will have to be paid a minimum amount of $13.00. Employees need to pay premium wages if the employees work for more than 40 hours in a week. In case of denial, you can seek compensation either by filing a class action lawsuit or by filing an unpaid wage lawsuit.
Overtime– Employers have to pay extra wages if the employee works for more than 8 hours a day or 40 hours a week. However, exempt employees cannot make claims for overtime wages. Exempt employees are the ones that receive a salary monthly and not hourly. They neither qualify for minimum wages nor are they entitled to overtime wage payments. According to the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), exempt employees can be classified as the following:
- Computer
- Executive
- Professional
- Administrative
- Outside sales
Rest and meal breaks– Meal and rest breaks have to be provided by the employers to the non-exempt employees. An employee who has worked for more than 5 hours a day is entitled to receive a 30 minutes meal/rest break. Employees are permitted to a second meal break if their working hour is 10 hours or more than 10 hours a day. Employees can take legal action if they are denied meal and rest breaks.
Employees can claim for the damages caused to them due to the non-payment of wages, failure to pay overtime, misclassification of employees as exempt employees, failure to provide meal breaks, and minimum wages.