A recent state appellate decision on employee time rounding is raising questions about its impact on California’s current and future wage policies and when there could be additional review by the California Supreme Court.
The decision in Camp v. Home Depot makes time rounding a less viable policy if using electronic timekeeping that’s capable of calculating the time down to the second, Amy, R. Patton, a partner with Payne & Fears, told the Northern California Record.
“It used to be when people kept time records by hand, time rounding was a convenience for the employers that was allowed, but with the Camp decision, we’re one step closer to that not being allowed,” Patton said. “The courts are just becoming more and more definitive on the use of rounding in the era of electronic timekeeping.”
A time-rounding standard had been established in the 2012 See’s v. Superior Court appellate decision.
While the California Supreme Court has yet to weigh in, that could change in view of the Camp ruling; it concludes by inviting the Supreme Court to take up the issue, after its interpretation in Donahue v. AMN (2021), which held that time rounding is not appropriate in the meal period context.
“So with that decision and this trend, with the Camp case, it wouldn’t surprise me if the California Supreme Court wouldn’t take it up, if there was a request to do so, and put a settling decision on this area of the law,” Patton said.
The court has been moving in this direction, Patton said, pointing to the 2018 Troester v Starbucks case, which held that California has no de minimis doctrine.
There may be some practical purposes for rounding, Patton noted, for instance where electronic timekeeping isn’t a possibility, but otherwise it could make sense to start transitioning away from time rounding.
“So there may be some more areas to flesh out, but I don’t think that employers are going to get a lot of deference for these policies from here on out,” Patton said.