Is my job breaking the law? (California Overtime)

Raiden333

So yeah, before anyone links me to handy sites like this, I've been doing some research and can't find this specifically addressed.

I work in data-entry, and the way our office is set up, we get work from our clients every morning and all that work must be completed by the end of the day. Some days are light days and we're out by 4, some days we get slammed and we're there till 7. With very very few exceptions, my average day is between 6 and 8 hours. Right now is our "light" season, so generally we're getting much lighter work loads, but there's the occasional heavy day that sends me over 8 hours. My position is classified as "limited hours", which is between part time and full time according to my supervisor.

Last timesheet I turned in had one hour of overtime, and my supervisor came to me and said "Hey, the president hasn't authorized any overtime for this month, so I need you to move that overtime hour to one of the days where you worked fewer hours."

I thought this was kind of bullshit, so I picked a day where I only worked 6 hours, and added an hour and a half to it instead of just an hour (so that I'd still be making the same money I would have made from overtime). Either my supervisor intended this, or didn't notice I added an hour and a half instead of an hour, because she just authorized it and forwarded it to payroll.

And it's not like I'm working late because I'm a slow employee; we don't have individual work queues, all the employees divide up the day's work and theoretically we're all supposed to stay until it's done, but a few of my co-workers always leave at the same time every day even when there's work left because they need to pick up kids and such.

Obviously, if she intends for me to be turning my overtime hours into normal hours straight across, that's illegal, and I'll find out when I turn in this timesheet (as I worked overtime again today). However, even if I convert each hour into 1.5 so that I'm still getting paid the same, I think it's kind of shitty that I can't have it acknowledged that I work overtime when I'm needed. Like, if I go in for a raise negotiation, I'd like to be able to point out that I'm working overtime once or twice a month during our light season (which a lot of our employees aren't doing).

So, my question is, is it legal to force employees to mark down overtime hours as 1.5 hours of normal time?

And if not, what should I do?

Thanks for any advice anyone has.

noir_blood

I don't think so, because as far as I understand, it order to actually accrue overtime, you have to go over forty hours a week. At least, that's been the case in every place I have worked.

So technically, unless you were going to be up to forty hours without that OT hour, you were technically wrong for putting 1.5 on a six hour day.

Raiden333

noir_blood wrote: »

I don't think so, because as far as I understand, it order to actually accrue overtime, you have to go over forty hours a week. At least, that's been the case in every place I have worked.

So technically, unless you were going to be up to forty hours without that OT hour, you were technically wrong for putting 1.5 on a six hour day.

Nope, at least not in California. From the link at the top of my post:

An 8-hour period constitutes a day’s work. Working beyond those hours, or more than 6 days in a week, is allowed as long as the employee is compensated for overtime pay.

1. An employee working beyond 8 hours should be given one and one-half times his or her regular rate of pay. This includes the first 8 hours of work on the 7th consecutive working day in a workweek and beyond the 8 hours (up to 12 hours) in any workday.

edit: I realize that the Disclaimer portion of that site makes it sound not exactly trustworthy, all the same info is here on the dir.ca.gov website.

Atrimus

So I have seen this happen before and while it's nice if they're still paying you the time and a half it's ethically and legally wrong for them to ask you to falsify your time sheets.

Powerpuppies

seems highly questionable but i don't know that you have anything to gain by doing something about it

sportzboytjw

Raiden333 wrote:

So yeah, before anyone links me to handy sites like this, I've been doing some research and can't find this specifically addressed.

I work in data-entry, and the way our office is set up, we get work from our clients every morning and all that work must be completed by the end of the day. Some days are light days and we're out by 4, some days we get slammed and we're there till 7. With very very few exceptions, my average day is between 6 and 8 hours. Right now is our "light" season, so generally we're getting much lighter work loads, but there's the occasional heavy day that sends me over 8 hours. My position is classified as "limited hours", which is between part time and full time according to my supervisor.

Last timesheet I turned in had one hour of overtime, and my supervisor came to me and said "Hey, the president hasn't authorized any overtime for this month, so I need you to move that overtime hour to one of the days where you worked fewer hours."

I thought this was kind of bullshit, so I picked a day where I only worked 6 hours, and added an hour and a half to it instead of just an hour (so that I'd still be making the same money I would have made from overtime). Either my supervisor intended this, or didn't notice I added an hour and a half instead of an hour, because she just authorized it and forwarded it to payroll.

And it's not like I'm working late because I'm a slow employee; we don't have individual work queues, all the employees divide up the day's work and theoretically we're all supposed to stay until it's done, but a few of my co-workers always leave at the same time every day even when there's work left because they need to pick up kids and such.

Obviously, if she intends for me to be turning my overtime hours into normal hours straight across, that's illegal, and I'll find out when I turn in this timesheet (as I worked overtime again today). However, even if I convert each hour into 1.5 so that I'm still getting paid the same, I think it's kind of shitty that I can't have it acknowledged that I work overtime when I'm needed. Like, if I go in for a raise negotiation, I'd like to be able to point out that I'm working overtime once or twice a month during our light season (which a lot of our employees aren't doing).

So, my question is, is it legal to force employees to mark down overtime hours as 1.5 hours of normal time?

And if not, what should I do?

Thanks for any advice anyone has.

It depends how you feel honestly.

Does your work hate overtime being on the books because INEFFICIENT AH WHY ARE WE PAYING OVERTIME or are they cool, but it's a stupid metric that they really watch?

Your boss knows you're working OT; it won't be a problem during negotiations unless your company is just a bad company. If they're asking you to push off OT as 1.5 hours, they'll understand that you do work OT as necessary. If it's just an awful place (which it could be), start looking for a new job, and when you do, don't badmouth the old company of course

Raiden333

Yeah okay, between Powerpuppies and sportzboytjw, I think I see this in a better light now.

You can consider this closed, thanks guys!