English-Only Rule in State Must Meet ‘Necessity’ Law

Question: Although only 2% of the workers at our company have direct contact with clients, there has been a move to require all employees to speak only English during work hours. Is this legal?

--A.B., Anaheim

Answer: Under a new law in California, a rule requiring employees to speak only English would be legal only if it is justified by “business necessity.”

According to the law, an employer must show that the English-only rule has an overriding legitimate business purpose, that it is necessary to the safe and efficient operation of the business, fulfills the business purpose of the employer, and that there is no alternative that would accomplish the business purpose with a less discriminatory effect.

If there were some event at your place of employment that affected the safe operation of the business, for example, your employer could justify the recent change in policy.

Without knowing why your employer changed its policy, however, I could not tell you with certainty if the policy is legal.

--Jo Tucker

Employment law attorney/arbitrator

Morrison & Foerster

Bonuses for Retained Employees Are Legal

Q: Recently I was laid off because my division is being sold. However, some short-term employees who remained were given several thousand dollars as bonuses that were not based on merit or length of service.

Management advised those who received bonuses to keep them confidential or be terminated.

Is this legal?

--K.W., Long Beach

A: An employer may give bonuses as an incentive to stay until the company is sold. Such bonuses are regarded as part of the employee’s regular rate of pay, and would be considered as wages.

An employer may not fire or formally discipline an employee who discloses the amount of his or her wages, even if told to keep quiet.

Aside from the bonus, your question raises other issues as well. There might be a discrimination claim, depending on the circumstances of your termination. At-will employees may be terminated at any time, but not for discriminatory or retaliatory reasons.

Were only older employees let go and younger ones retained? If you were a member of a protected class, because of your age, race or physical disability, for example, your termination might be discriminatory if workers who are not part of those classes were retained.

--Don D. Sessions

Employee rights attorney

Mission Viejo

Like It or Not, Workers, You Must Take Breaks

Q: Because we are a moving and storage business, most of our employees work in the field.

A number of workers resist taking a lunch period, even though we have told them that California law requires employees to take a lunch break of at least half an hour if the work day is more than six hours.

What is our obligation in this situation? We are not opposed to employee lunch breaks; we even prefer that employees take them.

We also are tired of trying to enforce a law that is designed to protect the rights of employees but which the employees resist.

--T.J., Upland

A: The law in this area is explicit--each employer must ensure that its employees take their meal periods.

As a general rule, California law prohibits employees from working more than five hours in a workday without taking a meal period of at least 30 minutes, during which time the employees must be relieved of all duties. Although an exception to this rule permits employees to waive the right to a meal period, the exception does not apply if an employee works more than six hours in a workday.

Despite your employees’ reluctance to take their meal periods, they cannot choose to skip them. The laws are designed to protect employees, even from themselves.

If the company fails to ensure that its employees take their mandatory meal periods, it will be subject to penalties equal to one additional hour of pay for each work day that each employee does not take his or her meal period.

--Deborah C. Saxe

Management attorney

Heller Ehrman White & McAuliffe