Tag Archives: Brinker v Superior Court

by Michael Kun

Some were beginning to wonder whether it would ever happen. After more than two years, the California Supreme Court has announced a hearing date in the much-awaited Brinker v. Superior Court case — November 8, 2011.

Unless the Court takes a detour, California employers should finally know the answer to a question that has long driven California’s billion dollar wage-hour class action industry — must an employer “ensure” that employers take meal and rest periods, or are they only required to make them “available” to employees.

Should the Supreme Court rule that employers need only make them “available,” wage-hour class actions will not grind to a halt. Plaintiffs’ counsel will merely change their allegations to allege that meal and rest breaks were not made “available.” But most employers should have valid defenses to such claims, and, perhaps just as importantly, they will not need to revise the way they operate.