Can a home caregiver work 5 24 hour shifts in a row in California
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Can a home caregiver work 5 24 hour shifts in a row in California
My aunt has a live-in
caretaker 5 days a week
twenty-four hours a day.
Her company has tried to
get her down to 4 days a
week stating that it’s
against the law to work
that much in California.
This is a living situation
but she is on call while
sleeping
Asked on March 7, 2019 under Employment Labor Law, California
Answers:
SJZ, Member, New York Bar / FreeAdvice Contributing Attorney
Answered 5 years ago | Contributor
No, it is not against the law: there is no maximum number of hours worked for the vast majorirty of employees.
Furthermore, being "on call" is not considered work time. An on-call employee is only working when actually "called" to do something. So say that she sleeps 8 hours a day during which, on average, she is woken to do something for your aunt 1 hour/night. Even if she worked the other 16 hours without any breaks, which is highly unlikely, she'd then be working 17, not 24, hours per day.
The above said, her employer can limit how many hours she works if they want (such as, for example, to limit overtime) since an employer can determine the hours its employees work.
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