Overtime pay is additional compensation for working over 40 hours
a week, and in California, over 8 hours in a day. Whether someone
should receive overtime pay depends on the work that they do, but
these general rules apply to all employees:
Ca State Overtime Law
The overtime laws are designed to protect employees, and the courts
construe them to give employees the maximum protection. Employees
are presumed to be entitled to overtime pay, and, under California
and federal law, the employer, not the employee, has the burden
of proof to show that it properly paid the employee.
An employee's right to overtime pay does not depend on whether
an employee is salaried. Many salaried employees are entitled to
overtime pay.
Work activities, not job titles and responsibilities, govern whether
you are entitled to overtime pay. In California, the law looks
to what employees do over half their work time. While employers
sometimes give employees untrue job titles for the purpose of avoiding
overtime pay, this does not affect employees' overtime rights.
An employer must pay overtime pay unless it can prove that an
employee is "exempt" from the overtime requirements. "Exempt" employees
do not get overtime pay. The exemptions are briefly listed as follows.
Click on any exemption to see to a more detailed description:
The Executive Exemption
This exemption applies to employees who spend over half their work
time managing businesses or departments of a business;
The Administrative Exemption
This exemption applies to employees who spend over half their work
time assisting the proprietor or other exempt individual in "servicing" a
business in matters of significance;
The Professional Exemption
This exemption applies to employees who have certain licenses to
practice a profession or who work in a "learned or artistic" profession;
The Computer Software Professional Exemption
This exemption applies to employees who work in highly theoretical
aspects of computer software and make over $41.00 an hour;
The Outside Salesperson Exemption
This exemption applies to employees who usually work away from
the workplace making sales and filling orders. However, the employee
cannot spend significant time doing the same work as other non-exempt
employees.
