(a) Any employer or other person acting on behalf of an employer who violates, or causes to be violated, a section of this chapter or any provision regulating hours and days of work in any order of the Industrial Welfare Commission shall be subject to a civil penalty as follows:
- (1) For any initial violation, fifty dollars ($50) for each underpaid employee for each pay period for which the employee was underpaid in addition to an amount sufficient to recover underpaid wages.
- (2) For each subsequent violation, one hundred dollars ($100) for each underpaid employee for each pay period for which the employee was underpaid in addition to an amount sufficient to recover underpaid wages.
- (3) Wages recovered pursuant to this section shall be paid to the affected employee.
(b) If upon inspection or investigation the Labor Commissioner determines that a person had paid or caused to be paid a wage for overtime work in violation of any provision of this chapter, any provision regulating hours and days of work in any order of the Industrial Welfare Commission, or any applicable local overtime law, the Labor Commissioner may issue a citation. The procedures for issuing, contesting, and enforcing judgments for citations or civil penalties issued by the Labor Commissioner for a violation of this chapter shall be the same as those set out in Section 1197.1.
(c) In a jurisdiction where a local entity has the legal authority to issue a citation against an employer for a violation of any applicable local overtime law, the Labor Commissioner, pursuant to a request from the local entity, may issue a citation against an employer for a violation of any applicable local overtime law if the local entity has not cited the employer for the same violation. If the Labor Commissioner issues a citation, the local entity shall not cite the employer for the same violation.
(d) The civil penalties provided for in this section are in addition to any other civil or criminal penalty provided by law.
(e) This section does not change the applicability of local overtime wage laws to any entity.
(Amended by Stats. 2015, Ch. 783, Sec. 1. (AB 970) Effective January 1, 2016.)
Leonard H. Sansanowicz is the principal of Sansanowicz Law Group, P.C. and represents employees in all aspects of employment law. He has been a Super Lawyers Southern California Rising Star each year from 2013 to 2018, and for the past four years has been named to their Up- and-Coming 100 list. He also is a member of the Executive Board of the California Employment Lawyers Association.
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