Title: Donohue v. AMN Services, LLC

State: california

Issuer: California Supreme Court

Document:

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF 
CALIFORNIA 
 
KENNEDY DONOHUE, 
Plaintiff and Appellant, 
v. 
AMN SERVICES, LLC, 
Defendant and Respondent.  
 
S253677 
 
Fourth Appellate District, Division One 
D071865 
 
San Diego County Superior Court 
37-2014-00012605-CU-OE-CTL 
 
 
February 25, 2021 
 
Justice Liu authored the opinion of the Court, in which Chief 
Justice Cantil-Sakauye and Justices Corrigan, Cuéllar, 
Kruger, Groban and Hoffstadt* concurred. 
 
 
* 
Associate Justice of the Court of Appeal, Second Appellate 
District, Division Two, assigned by the Chief Justice pursuant 
to article VI, section 6 of the California Constitution. 
 
1 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
S253677 
 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J.
 
Under California law, employers must generally provide 
employees with one 30-minute meal period that begins no later 
than the end of the fifth hour of work and another 30-minute 
meal period that begins no later than the end of the tenth hour 
of work.  (Lab. Code, § 512, subd. (a); Industrial Welfare 
Commission (IWC) wage order No. 4-2001, § 11(A) (Wage Order 
No. 4).)  If an employer does not provide an employee with a 
compliant meal period, then “the employer shall pay the 
employee one additional hour of pay at the employee’s regular 
rate of compensation for each workday that the meal . . . period 
is not provided.”  (Lab. Code, § 226.7, subd. (c); Wage Order 
No. 4, § 11(B).)   
In this case, we decide two questions of law relating to 
meal periods.  First, we hold that employers cannot engage in 
the practice of rounding time punches — that is, adjusting the 
hours that an employee has actually worked to the nearest 
preset time increment — in the meal period context.  The meal 
period provisions are designed to prevent even minor 
infringements on meal period requirements, and rounding is 
incompatible with that objective.  Second, we hold that time 
records showing noncompliant meal periods raise a rebuttable 
presumption of meal period violations, including at the 
summary judgment stage. 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
2 
In light of our holdings, we reverse the Court of Appeal’s 
judgment and remand the matter to permit either party to bring 
a new summary adjudication motion as to the meal period claim.  
(See TRB Investments, Inc. v. Fireman’s Fund Ins. Co. (2006) 40 
Cal.4th 19, 23, 31–32 (TRB Investments).)  The remand offers 
the parties the opportunity to present evidence and arguments 
bearing on the question of liability in light of our analysis here.   
I. 
Defendant AMN Services, LLC (AMN) is a healthcare 
services and staffing company that recruits nurses for 
temporary contract assignments.  Between September 2012 and 
February 2014, plaintiff Kennedy Donohue worked as a nurse 
recruiter at AMN’s San Diego offices.  In that role, Donohue did 
not have predetermined shifts but was expected to work eight 
hours per day.  Per AMN’s company policy, nurse recruiters 
were provided with 30-minute meal periods beginning no later 
than the end of the fifth hour of work.  AMN’s policy and 
trainings 
emphasized 
that 
the 
meal 
period 
was 
an 
“uninterrupted 30 minute” break, during which employees were 
“relieved of all job duties,” were “free to leave the office site,” and 
“control[led] the time.”  The policy also specified that 
supervisors should not “impede or discourage team members 
from taking their break.” 
Until April 2015, AMN used an electronic timekeeping 
system called Team Time to track its employees’ compensable 
time.  Employees used their work desktop computers to punch 
in and out of Team Time, including at the beginning of the day, 
at the beginning of lunch, at the end of lunch, and at the end of 
the day.  Employees could also ask to manually adjust any 
inaccurate time punches — for example, if they forgot to clock 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
3 
out for lunch or if they worked when they were clocked out.  For 
purposes of calculating work time and compensation, Team 
Time rounded the time punches to the nearest 10-minute 
increment.  For example, if an employee clocked out for lunch at 
11:02 a.m. and clocked in after lunch at 11:25 a.m., Team Time 
would have recorded the time punches as 11:00 a.m. and 11:30 
a.m.  Although the actual meal period was 23 minutes, Team 
Time would have recorded the meal period as 30 minutes.  
Similarly, if an employee clocked in for work at 6:59 a.m. and 
clocked out for lunch at 12:04 p.m., Team Time would have 
rounded the time punches to 7:00 a.m. and 12:00 p.m.  In that 
case, the actual meal period started after five hours and five 
minutes of work, but Team Time would have recorded the meal 
period as starting after exactly five hours of work.  
AMN also used Team Time to manage potentially 
noncompliant meal periods.  Before September 2012, whenever 
Team Time records showed a missed meal period, a meal period 
shorter than 30 minutes, or a meal period taken after five hours 
of work, AMN assumed there had been a meal period violation 
and paid the employee a premium wage.  In September 2012, 
AMN added a feature to Team Time to comply with the meal 
period requirements articulated in Brinker Restaurant Corp. v. 
Superior Court (2012) 53 Cal.4th 1004 (Brinker):  When an 
employee recorded a missed, short, or delayed meal period, a 
dropdown menu would appear on Team Time.  The dropdown 
menu prompted the employee to choose one of three options:  (1) 
“I was provided an opportunity to take a 30 min break before the 
end of my 5th hour of work but chose not to”; (2) “I was provided 
an opportunity to take a 30 min break before the end of my 5th 
hour of work but chose to take a shorter/later break”; (3) “I was 
not provided an opportunity to take a 30 min break before the 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
4 
end of my 5th hour of work.”  The employee was required to 
choose an option before submitting his or her timesheet at the 
end of the pay period.  If the employee chose the first or second 
option, then AMN assumed the employee was provided with a 
compliant meal period but voluntarily chose not to take one, and 
the employee did not receive premium pay for a meal period 
violation.  If the employee chose the third option, then AMN 
assumed there had been a meal period violation and paid the 
employee a premium wage.  In addition, at the end of each 
biweekly pay period, employees were required to sign a 
certification statement:  “By submitting this timesheet, I am 
certifying that I have reviewed the time entries I made and 
confirm they are true and accurate.  I am also confirming that 
. . . I was provided the opportunity to take all meal breaks to 
which I was entitled, or, if not, I have reported on this timesheet 
that I was not provided the opportunity to take all such meal 
breaks . . . .” 
AMN relied on the rounded time punches generated by 
Team Time to determine whether a meal period was short or 
delayed.  Consider the example above, where a 23-minute lunch 
starting at 11:02 a.m. and ending at 11:25 a.m. was recorded on 
Team Time as a 30-minute lunch starting at 11:00 a.m. and 
ending at 11:30 a.m.  Before September 2012, AMN would not 
have paid a premium wage for this lunch because it would have 
appeared as a full 30-minute meal period in the Team Time 
records.  Similarly, after September 2012, the dropdown menu 
would not have been triggered for this lunch because it would 
have appeared as a compliant meal period on Team Time.  In 
other words, Team Time would not have prompted the employee 
taking the lunch to indicate whether there had been a meal 
period violation. 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
5 
In April 2014, Donohue filed a class action lawsuit against 
AMN.  Donohue alleged various wage and hour violations, 
including the meal period claim at issue here.  In October 2015, 
the trial court certified a class of all nonexempt California nurse 
recruiters who were employed by AMN between April 23, 2010 
and April 26, 2015 with respect to the meal period claim.  April 
26, 2015 marks the end of the class period because on that date 
AMN switched to a timekeeping system that does not round 
time entries. 
In November 2016, Donohue filed a motion for summary 
adjudication.  As to the meal period claim, Donohue argued that 
AMN denied its employees compliant meal periods, improperly 
rounded time records for meal periods using Team Time, and 
failed to pay premium wages for noncompliant meal periods.  To 
support the motion, Donohue submitted her testimony that 
AMN had an office culture that discouraged employees from 
taking full and timely lunches.  Donohue also provided a 
declaration from an expert witness, a statistics professor.  
According to the expert, the use of Team Time resulted in the 
denial of premium wages for 40,110 short lunches and 6,651 
delayed lunches during the class period, which totaled 
$802,077.08.  The expert calculated the number of noncompliant 
lunches for which no premium wages were paid by comparing 
the rounded time records for meal periods to the actual time 
records.  For example, the expert would have counted a 23-
minute lunch starting at 11:02 a.m. and ending at 11:25 a.m., 
recorded on Team Time as a 30-minute lunch starting at 11:00 
a.m. and ending at 11:30 a.m., as an uncompensated short 
lunch. 
AMN filed a cross-motion for summary judgment or, in the 
alternative, summary adjudication.  As to the meal period claim, 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
6 
AMN contended that it did not have a uniform policy or practice 
of denying employees compliant meal periods.  It also argued 
that Donohue did not plead in the operative complaint that 
AMN’s rounding policy resulted in meal period violations.  AMN 
submitted the declarations of 40 class members in support of its 
motion.  Thirty of the nurse recruiters stated that they “always” 
or “usually” took lunches that were at least 30 minutes long.  
Other recruiters said that they only “sometimes” took 30-minute 
lunches but that it was their choice to forgo a full lunch on the 
other days.  No declarant stated that a supervisor had tried to 
discourage him or her from taking a full or timely meal period.   
AMN also submitted a declaration from its expert witness, 
a labor economist and statistician.  The expert explained that 
because AMN’s rounding policy sometimes rounded meal period 
times up and sometimes down, AMN sometimes paid employees 
for a few extra minutes they did not work and sometimes did not 
pay them for a few minutes that they did work.  Unlike 
Donohue’s expert, AMN’s expert did not account for meal period 
premium wages that would have been paid based on actual meal 
period times.  According to the expert, AMN’s practice of 
rounding meal period times evened out over time and actually 
resulted in the overcompensation of the class by 85 work hours.  
The expert also stated that based on the nurse recruiters’ actual 
time punches, the average length of a meal period during the 
class period was 45.6 minutes. 
The trial court granted AMN’s motion for summary 
judgment and denied Donohue’s motion for summary 
adjudication, including on the meal period claim.  The court 
concluded there was insufficient evidence that AMN had a policy 
or practice of denying employees compliant meal periods.  
According to the court, AMN’s meal period policy complied with 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
7 
California law, and its practice of rounding the time punches for 
meal periods was proper.  The court said that even if no case has 
ever applied rounding to meal periods, “the rationale behind 
allowing rounding for work time would be the same for meal 
break time.”  According to the court, AMN’s rounding policy 
fairly compensated employees over time, and there was 
insufficient evidence that supervisors at AMN prevented 
employees from taking compliant meal periods.  
The Court of Appeal affirmed and generally agreed with 
the trial court’s reasoning as to the meal period claim.  The court 
decided that it was proper for AMN to round time punches for 
meal periods.  (Donohue v. AMN Services, LLC (2018) 29 
Cal.App.5th 1068, 1086–1092 (Donohue).)  According to the 
court, the plain text of Labor Code section 512 and Wage Order 
No. 4, which govern meal periods, does not prohibit rounding.  
(Donohue, at p. 1087.)  The court explained that rounding “ ‘is a 
practical method for calculating worktime and can be a neutral 
calculation tool for providing full payment to employees’ ” and 
that no case law suggests rounding does not apply to meal 
periods.  (Id. at p. 1090.)  The court rejected Donohue’s 
argument that rounding meal period time punches “ ‘would 
quickly eviscerate employee[s’] statutory right to full 30 minute 
meal periods.’ ”  (Ibid.) 
The court also concluded that AMN’s rounding policy was 
neutral on its face and as applied, as required by California law.  
(Donohue, supra, 29 Cal.App.5th at pp. 1083–1086.)  The court 
agreed with AMN that the rounding policy fully compensated 
employees 
over 
time 
and 
actually 
resulted 
in 
the 
overcompensation of the class as a whole.  (Id. at p. 1084.)  The 
court rejected Donohue’s argument that the rounding policy did 
not properly pay employees premium wages for meal period 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
8 
violations.  (Id. at p. 1090.)  According to the court, “the 
neutrality of a rounding policy does not depend on the frequency 
of penalties.”  (Ibid.) 
In addition, the court rejected Donohue’s argument that 
time records showing missing, short, or delayed meal periods 
give rise to a rebuttable presumption of meal period violations.  
(Donohue, supra, 29 Cal.App.5th at pp. 1087–1088.)  In the 
court’s view, this rebuttable presumption applies only at the 
class certification stage, not at the summary judgment stage.  
(Ibid.)  Finally, the court considered Donohue’s testimony that 
AMN’s office culture discouraged employees from taking full and 
timely lunches.  (Id. at p. 1091.)  The court noted that Donohue 
never indicated a meal period violation on Team Time and 
always certified that her timesheet was accurate.  (Ibid.)  Thus, 
the court concluded, her testimony was insufficient to raise a 
triable issue of material fact as to the meal period claim. 
We granted review to address two questions of law 
relating to the meal period claim:  whether an employer may 
properly round time punches for meal periods, and whether time 
records showing noncompliant meal periods raise a rebuttable 
presumption of meal period violations. 
II. 
 
We first examine whether the practice of rounding time 
punches, which was developed for the purpose of calculating 
wages, can be properly applied to the meal period context.  To 
be clear, the question is not whether AMN’s rounding policy 
resulted in the proper compensation of employees for all time 
worked.  Donohue does not dispute that the rounding policy 
overcompensated the class by 85 work hours, as AMN’s expert 
concluded, when considering only compensation for time 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
9 
worked.  Instead, the issue is whether AMN’s rounding policy 
resulted in the proper payment of premium wages for meal 
period violations.  AMN’s claim that it overpaid the class based 
on time worked does not address this issue. 
 
AMN, for its part, does not argue that any meal periods 
rounded to 30 minutes are per se lawful.  Rather, it argues that 
the undisputed evidence shows that no meal period violations 
occurred for which premium wages were not paid.  AMN asserts 
that this evidence, regardless of its use of rounding, supports 
judgment on the meal period claim.  But because AMN asserted 
that rounding applies to meal periods as an affirmative defense 
and because the trial court certified a meal period class on the 
basis of this question, the issue of rounding is properly before 
us.   
 
The issue arises solely under state law because the federal 
Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 (29 U.S.C. § 201 et seq.) does 
not require employers to provide meal periods to employees.  
(Mitchell v. JCG Industries, Inc. (7th Cir. 2014) 745 F.3d 837, 
840.)  In California, “wage and hour claims are today governed 
by two complementary and occasionally overlapping sources of 
authority:  the provisions of the Labor Code, enacted by the 
Legislature, and a series of 18 wage orders, adopted by the 
IWC.”  (Brinker, supra, 53 Cal.4th at p. 1026.)  “The IWC is the 
state agency empowered to promulgate wage orders, which are 
legislative regulations specifying minimum requirements with 
respect to wages, hours, and working conditions.”  (Augustus v. 
ABM Security Services, Inc. (2016) 2 Cal.5th 257, 262, fn. 5 
(ABM Security).)   
“The IWC’s wage orders are to be accorded the same 
dignity as statutes.  They are ‘presumptively valid’ legislative 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
10 
regulations 
of 
the 
employment 
relationship 
[citation], 
regulations that must be given ‘independent effect’ separate and 
apart from any statutory enactments [citation].”  (Brinker, 
supra, 53 Cal.4th at p. 1027.)  “When construing the Labor Code 
and wage orders, we adopt the construction that best gives effect 
to the purpose of the Legislature and the IWC.  [Citations.]  
Time and again, we have characterized that purpose as the 
protection of employees—particularly given the extent of 
legislative concern about working conditions, wages, and hours 
when the Legislature enacted key portions of the Labor Code.  
[Citations.]  In furtherance of that purpose, we liberally 
construe the Labor Code and wage orders to favor the protection 
of employees.”  (ABM Security, supra, 2 Cal.5th at p. 262.) 
 
Wage Order No. 4, which applies to professional, clerical, 
mechanical, and similar occupations, applies to the certified 
class of AMN nurse recruiters here.  (Wage Order No. 4, § 2(O).)  
This wage order and the relevant statute provide:  “No employer 
shall employ any person for a work period of more than five (5) 
hours without a meal period of not less than 30 minutes . . . .  
Unless the employee is relieved of all duty during a 30 minute 
meal period, the meal period shall be considered an ‘on duty’ 
meal period and counted as time worked.”  (Wage Order No. 4, 
§ 11(A); accord, Lab. Code, § 512, subd. (a) [“An employer shall 
not employ an employee for a work period of more than five 
hours per day without providing the employee with a meal 
period of not less than 30 minutes . . . .  An employer shall not 
employ an employee for a work period of more than 10 hours per 
day without providing the employee with a second meal period 
of not less than 30 minutes . . . .”].)   
This means that employers must generally provide “a first 
meal period [of at least 30 minutes] no later than the end of an 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
11 
employee’s fifth hour of work, and a second meal period [of at 
least 30 minutes] no later than the end of an employee’s 10th 
hour of work.”  (Brinker, supra, 53 Cal.4th at p. 1041.)  In 
Brinker, we clarified that an “employer satisfies this obligation 
if it relieves its employees of all duty, relinquishes control over 
their activities and permits them a reasonable opportunity to 
take an uninterrupted 30-minute break, and does not impede or 
discourage them from doing so. . . .  [¶]  . . . [T]he employer is not 
obligated to police meal breaks and ensure no work thereafter is 
performed.”  (Id. at p. 1040.)  There is no meal period violation 
if an employee voluntarily chooses to work during a meal period 
after the employer has relieved the employee of all duty.  (Id. at 
pp. 1040–1041.)  The voluntariness of an employee’s choice 
matters because “an employer may not undermine a formal 
policy of providing meal breaks by pressuring employees to 
perform their duties in ways that omit breaks.”  (Id. at p. 1040.) 
 
If an employer does not provide an employee with a 
compliant meal period, then the employer must provide the 
employee with premium pay for the violation.  Specifically, the 
relevant wage order and statute provide:  “If an employer fails 
to provide an employee a meal period in accordance with the 
applicable provisions of this order, the employer shall pay the 
employee one (1) hour of pay at the employee’s regular rate of 
compensation for each workday that the meal period is not 
provided.”  (Wage Order No. 4, § 11(B); accord, Lab. Code, 
§ 226.7, subd. (c) [“If an employer fails to provide an employee a 
meal . . . period in accordance with a state law, including, but 
not limited to, an applicable statute or applicable regulation, 
standard, or order of the Industrial Welfare Commission . . . the 
employer shall pay the employee one additional hour of pay at 
the employee’s regular rate of compensation for each workday 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
12 
that the meal . . . period is not provided.”].)  Under this 
provision, even a minor infringement of the meal period triggers 
the premium pay obligation.  In addition to providing premium 
pay, the employer must compensate the employee for any time 
worked during the meal period if “it ‘knew or reasonably should 
have known that the worker was working through the 
authorized meal period.’ ”  (Brinker, supra, 53 Cal.4th at 
p. 1040, fn. 19.)  To avoid liability, an employer must provide its 
employees with full and timely meal periods whenever those 
meal periods are required.  
 
The practice of rounding time punches for meal periods is 
inconsistent with the purpose of the Labor Code provisions and 
the IWC wage order.  The text of Labor Code section 512 and 
Wage Order No. 4 sets precise time requirements for meal 
periods.  Each meal period must be “not less than 30 minutes,” 
and no employee shall work “more than five hours per day” or 
“more than 10 hours per day” without being provided with a 
meal period.  (Lab. Code, § 512, subd. (a); accord, Wage Order 
No. 4, § 11(A) [“No employer shall employ any person for a work 
period of more than five (5) hours without a meal period of not 
less than 30 minutes . . . .”]; see Brinker, supra, 53 Cal.4th at 
p. 1041.)  These provisions speak directly to the calculation of 
time for meal period purposes. 
 
The precision of the time requirements set out in Labor 
Code section 512 and Wage Order No. 4 — “not less than 30 
minutes” and “five hours per day” or “ten hours per day” — is at 
odds with the imprecise calculations that rounding involves.  
The regulatory scheme that encompasses the meal period 
provisions is concerned with small amounts of time.  (Troester v. 
Starbucks Corp. (2018) 5 Cal.5th 829, 844 (Troester).)  For 
example, we have “requir[ed] strict adherence to” the Labor 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
13 
Code’s requirement that employees receive two daily 10-minute 
rest periods and “scrupulously guarded against encroachments 
on” these periods.  (Ibid.)  The same vigilance is warranted here.  
Given the relatively short length of a 30-minute meal period, the 
potential incursion that might result from rounding is 
significant.  (See Kaanaana v. Barrett Business Services, Inc. 
(2018) 29 Cal.App.5th 778, 801 (Kaanaana) [“ ‘On a 30-minute 
break, time is scarce’ ” and “ ‘[w]hen time is scarce, minutes 
count.’ ”], review granted Feb. 27, 2019, S253458.) 
Consider, for example, an employee who is provided with 
a 21-minute lunch from 12:04 p.m. to 12:25 p.m.  Under AMN’s 
timekeeping system, which rounded time punches to the nearest 
10-minute increment, the lunch would have been recorded as a 
30-minute lunch from 12:00 p.m. to 12:30 p.m.  In that scenario, 
an employee would have lost nine of the 30 minutes — or almost 
a third of the time — to which he or she was entitled, and Team 
Time would not have flagged the lunch as a meal period 
violation.  Small rounding errors can amount to a significant 
infringement on an employee’s right to a 30-minute meal period. 
 
The premium pay structure under Labor Code section 
226.7 and Wage Order No. 4 confirms that rounding is 
inappropriate in the meal period context.  In general, premium 
pay serves the dual purposes of compensating employees for 
their injuries and incentivizing employers to comply with labor 
standards.  (Murphy v. Kenneth Cole Productions, Inc. (2007) 40 
Cal.4th 1094, 1110 (Murphy).)  In the meal period context, an 
employee receives the full amount of premium pay — one 
additional hour of pay at the employee’s regular rate of 
compensation for each workday that the meal period is not 
provided — regardless of the extent of the violation.  (Lab. Code, 
§ 226.7, subd. (c); Wage Order No. 4, § 11(B).)  In other words, 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
14 
whether an employer provides a shortened meal period or no 
meal period at all, the employee receives one additional hour of 
pay. 
The premise of this approach is that even relatively minor 
infringements on meal periods can cause substantial burdens to 
the employee.  Forcing employees to work through their meal 
periods not only causes economic burdens in the form of extra 
work but also noneconomic burdens on the employees’ health, 
safety, and well-being.  (Murphy, supra, 40 Cal.4th at p. 1113.)  
Employees denied compliant meal periods “face greater risk of 
work-related accidents and increased stress” and lose valuable 
time “free from employer control that is often needed to be able 
to accomplish important personal tasks.”  (Ibid.)  Shortening or 
delaying a meal period by even a few minutes may exacerbate 
risks associated with stress or fatigue, especially for workers 
who are on their feet most of the day or who perform manual 
labor or repetitive tasks.  Further, within a 30-minute 
timeframe, a few minutes can make a significant difference 
when it comes to eating an unhurried meal, scheduling a 
doctor’s appointment, giving instructions to a babysitter, 
refreshing oneself with a cup of coffee, or simply resting before 
going back to work. 
By requiring premium pay for any violation, no matter 
how minor, the structure makes clear that employers must 
provide compliant meal periods whenever such a period is 
triggered.  This corroborates the conclusion that rounding is 
improper here.  A premium pay scheme that discourages 
employers from infringing on meal periods by even a few 
minutes cannot be reconciled with a policy that counts those 
minutes as negligible rounding errors. 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
15 
Legislative history supports this understanding.  “Meal 
and rest periods have long been viewed as part of the remedial 
worker protection framework. . . .  Concerned with the health 
and welfare of employees, the IWC issued wage orders 
mandating the provision of meal and rest periods in 1916 and 
1932, respectively. . . .  The wage orders required meal and rest 
periods after specified hours of work.  The only remedy available 
to employees, however, was injunctive relief aimed at 
preventing future abuse.  In 2000, due to a lack of employer 
compliance, the IWC added a pay remedy to the wage orders, 
providing that employers who fail to provide a meal or rest 
period ‘shall pay the employee one (1) hour of pay at the 
employee’s regular rate of compensation for each work day’ that 
the period is not provided.”  (Murphy, supra, 40 Cal.4th at 
pp. 1105–1106, citations omitted.)  Around the same time, the 
Legislature “wrote into statute various guarantees that 
previously had been left to the IWC, including meal break 
guarantees.”  (Brinker, supra, 53 Cal.4th at pp. 1037–1038.) 
The legislative history indicates that the meal period 
provisions are not “aimed at protecting or providing employees’ 
wages.  Instead, [they are] primarily concerned with ensuring 
the health and welfare of employees by requiring that employers 
provide meal . . . periods as mandated by the IWC.”  (Kirby v. 
Immoos Fire Protection, Inc. (2012) 53 Cal.4th 1244, 1255.)  As 
Donohue argues, the health and safety concerns underlying 
these provisions distinguish the meal period context from the 
wage calculation context, in which the practice of rounding time 
punches was developed.  For purposes of calculating wages, 
counting slightly fewer minutes one day can be made up by 
counting a few more minutes another day.  But the same is not 
true for meal periods.  Under the applicable statute and wage 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
16 
order, a shorter or delayed meal period one day cannot be offset 
by a longer or earlier meal period another day.  The premium 
pay scheme reflects the Legislature’s and the IWC’s 
determination that infringements on meal period requirements 
threaten employees’ health and safety whenever they occur 
(Murphy, supra, 40 Cal.4th at p. 1113; Kaanaana, supra, 29 
Cal.App.5th at p. 801, rev.gr.), and the scheme was enacted to 
address inadequate employer compliance (Murphy, at pp. 1105–
1106).  Rounding policies are at odds with the requirement that 
employers pay the full premium wage for meal period violations.  
When the actual times that an employee must work during a 
day reveal a meal period violation, the violation cannot be 
papered over by rounding. 
This understanding also comports with the remedial 
purpose of the Labor Code and wage orders.  “Because the laws 
authorizing the regulation of wages, hours, and working 
conditions are remedial in nature, courts construe these 
provisions liberally, with an eye to promoting the worker 
protections they were intended to provide.”  (Prachasaisoradej 
v. Ralphs Grocery Co., Inc. (2007) 42 Cal.4th 217, 227.)  As we 
have explained, rounding is incompatible with promoting strict 
adherence to the safeguards for workers’ health, safety, and 
well-being that meal periods are intended to provide. 
The Court of Appeal here relied on See’s Candy Shops, Inc. 
v. Superior Court (2012) 210 Cal.App.4th 889 (See’s Candy I).  
See’s Candy I concluded that employers may use rounded time 
punches to calculate regular and overtime wages if the rounding 
policy is neutral on its face and as applied.  (Id. at p. 907.)  That 
court consulted a federal regulation under the Fair Labor 
Standards Act of 1938 that addresses rounding practices.  (29 
C.F.R. § 785.48(b) (2020).)  The regulation, first promulgated in 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
17 
1961, states:  “It has been found that in some industries, 
particularly where time clocks are used, there has been the 
practice for many years of recording the employees’ starting 
time and stopping time to the nearest 5 minutes, or to the 
nearest one-tenth or quarter of an hour.  Presumably, this 
arrangement averages out so that the employees are fully 
compensated for all the time they actually work.  For 
enforcement purposes this practice of computing working time 
will be accepted, provided that it is used in such a manner that 
it will not result, over a period of time, in failure to compensate 
the employees properly for all the time they have actually 
worked.”  (Ibid.) 
 
Federal courts had interpreted the regulation to permit 
rounding policies as long as they “on average, favor[] neither 
overpayment nor underpayment” and do not “ ‘consistently 
result[] in a failure to pay employees for time worked.’ ”  (Alonzo 
v. Maximus, Inc. (C.D.Cal. 2011) 832 F.Supp.2d 1122, 1126.)  
Conversely, rounding policies violate the regulation if they 
“systematically undercompensate employees” (id. at pp. 1126–
1127), such as when the rounding policy “encompasses only 
rounding down” (Eyles v. Uline, Inc. (N.D.Tex., Sept. 4, 2009, 
No. 4:08-CV-577-A) 2009 WL 2868447, p. *4).   
 
The See’s Candy I court observed that the Division of 
Labor Standards Enforcement (DLSE), the agency that enforces 
California’s labor laws, had adopted the federal regulation in its 
manual.  (See’s Candy I, supra, 210 Cal.App.4th at p. 902; see 
ibid. [DLSE Manual is not binding but may be considered for its 
persuasive value].)  The court then concluded it was appropriate 
to adopt the federal regulatory standard:  “Assuming a 
rounding-over-time policy is neutral, both facially and as 
applied, the practice is proper under California law because its 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
18 
net effect is to permit employers to efficiently calculate hours 
worked without imposing any burden on employees.”  (See’s 
Candy I, supra, 210 Cal.App.4th at p. 903.)  The court observed 
that employers across the country have long used rounding and 
it would be unreasonable to prevent California employers from 
doing the same.  (Ibid.)  The court held that an employer is 
entitled to use a rounding policy if it “is fair and neutral on its 
face and ‘it is used in such a manner that it will not result, over 
a period of time, in failure to compensate the employees properly 
for all the time they have actually worked.’ ”  (Id. at p. 907.) 
 
The See’s Candy I court believed this rounding standard is 
consistent with Labor Code section 204, subdivision (a), which 
provides:  “All wages . . . earned by any person in any 
employment are due and payable twice during each calendar 
month, on days designated in advance by the employer as the 
regular paydays.”  According to the court, the focus of section 
204 is on the timing of wage payments, not the way those wages 
are calculated.  (See’s Candy I, supra, 210 Cal.App.4th at 
pp. 904–905.)  In addition, the court observed that the phrase 
“all wages” does not necessarily refer to an amount calculated 
on the basis of unrounded time punches.  (Id. at p. 905 
[“Fundamentally, the question whether all wages have been 
paid is different from the issue of how an employer calculates 
the number of hours worked and thus what wages are owed.  
Section 204 does not address the measurement issue.”].)  Thus, 
the court concluded, the phrase “all wages” in section 204 does 
not bar the practice of rounding time punches. 
 
Further, See’s Candy I held that rounding is consistent 
with Labor Code section 510, subdivision (a), which provides:  
“Any work in excess of eight hours in one workday and any work 
in excess of 40 hours in any one workweek . . . shall be 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
19 
compensated at the rate of no less than one and one-half times 
the regular rate of pay for an employee.”  The court said the 
provision “sets the multiplier for the rate at which ‘[a]ny’ 
overtime work must be paid” and “has nothing to do with 
rounding or calculating time.”  (See’s Candy I, supra, 210 
Cal.App.4th at p. 905.)  The court also rejected the argument 
that rounding can never be neutral because California law 
requires the compensation rate to increase after eight hours of 
work a day.  (Id. at pp. 905–906.)  Ultimately, the court said, 
whether California’s overtime rules render a rounding policy 
unfair is a factual, not legal, issue.  (Id. at p. 906.) 
Since See’s Candy I was decided, state and federal courts 
have applied its standard to determine whether various 
rounding policies are valid under California law.  (See, e.g., 
David v. Queen of Valley Medical Center (2020) 51 Cal.App.5th 
653, 664; AHMC Healthcare, Inc. v. Superior Court (2018) 24 
Cal.App.5th 1014, 1027–1028; Utne v. Home Depot U.S.A., Inc. 
(2017) (N.D.Cal. Dec. 4, 2017, No. 16-cv-01854-RS) 2017 WL 
5991863, pp. *2–*3.)  This court has never decided the validity 
of the rounding standard articulated in See’s Candy I, and we 
are not asked to do so here. 
But even assuming the validity of See’s Candy I, a 
rounding policy in the meal period context does not comport with 
its neutrality standard.  As noted, failing to provide employees 
with full and timely meal periods burdens their health, safety, 
and well-being by aggravating risks associated with stress or 
fatigue.  By deeming delayed or shortened meal breaks as 
“timely” and “complete” when they are not, a rounding policy 
erodes the health and safety protections that the meal period 
requirements are intended to achieve.  (See Murphy, supra, 40 
Cal.4th at p. 1113.)  Moreover, in articulating its standard, See’s 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
20 
Candy I reasoned that the rounding policy “ ‘averages out’ ” and 
“employees are fully compensated ‘over a period of time.’ ”  (See’s 
Candy I, supra, 210 Cal.App.4th at p. 901.)  In the meal period 
context, however, there is an asymmetry between the treatment 
of rounded-up minutes (i.e., time not worked that is 
compensated with regular pay) and the treatment of rounded-
down minutes (i.e., time worked that may trigger premium pay). 
As noted, under AMN’s policy, a 21-minute lunch from 
12:04 p.m. to 12:25 p.m. would be recorded as a 30-minute lunch 
from 12:00 p.m. to 12:30 p.m.  Meanwhile, a 38-minute lunch 
from 11:55 a.m. to 12:33 p.m. would be recorded as a 30-minute 
lunch from 12:00 p.m. to 12:30 p.m.  This means that the 
rounding policy, while never triggering premium pay for 
compliant meal periods, does not always trigger premium pay 
for noncompliant meal periods.  The same concern applies to the 
timing of meal periods; the policy never triggers premium pay 
for early or on-time meal periods, but it does not always trigger 
premium pay for meal periods that are improperly delayed. 
AMN argues that its rounding policy was neutral over 
time because it sometimes paid employees for a few extra 
minutes that they did not work and sometimes did not pay them 
for a few minutes that they did work.  AMN asserts that the 
policy slightly overcompensated the class as a whole.  But this 
argument does not properly account for the underpayment of 
premium pay.  It is true that in the 38-minute lunch example 
above, the rounding policy would count the extra eight minutes 
of lunch as work time and would trigger regular pay for those 
eight minutes.  But in the 21-minute lunch example, the 
rounding policy does not trigger the “one additional hour of 
[regular] pay” (Lab. Code, § 226.7, subd. (c); Wage Order No. 4, 
§ 11(B)) that the employee is owed.  In this respect, the rounding 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
21 
policy is not neutral.  It never provides employees with premium 
pay when such pay is not owed, but it does not always trigger 
premium pay when such pay is owed. 
We recognize that rounding was developed as a means of 
“efficiently calculat[ing] hours worked” and wages owed to 
employees (See’s Candy I, supra, 210 Cal.App.4th at p. 903) and 
is useful “in some industries, particularly where time clocks are 
used” (29 C.F.R. § 785.48(b) (2020)).  But technological advances 
may help employers to track time more precisely, and 
“employers are in a better position than employees to devise 
alternatives.”  (Troester, supra, 5 Cal.5th at p. 848.)  In this case, 
AMN was already using an electronic timekeeping system, 
Team Time, that recorded employees’ unrounded time punches.  
The system could have kept track of potentially noncompliant 
meal periods using those unrounded time punches instead of 
rounding the punches to the nearest 10-minute increment.  As 
Donohue observes, Team Time actually had to take the extra 
step of converting the unrounded time punches to rounded ones; 
it is not clear what efficiencies were gained from this practice.  
AMN eventually switched to a new timekeeping system that 
does not round time punches after this lawsuit was filed.  As 
technology continues to evolve, the practical advantages of 
rounding policies may diminish further.   
III. 
We now consider whether time records showing 
noncompliant meal periods raise a rebuttable presumption of 
meal period violations at summary judgment.  We hold they do. 
This rebuttable presumption was first discussed in Justice 
Werdegar’s concurrence in Brinker:  “Employers covered by 
Industrial Welfare Commission (IWC) wage order No. 5-2001 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
22 
(Cal. Code Regs., tit. 8, § 11050) have an obligation both to 
relieve their employees for at least one meal period for shifts 
over five hours (id., subd. 11(A)) and to record having done so 
(id., subd. 7(A)(3) [‘Meal periods . . . shall also be recorded.’]).  If 
an employer’s records show no meal period for a given shift over 
five hours, a rebuttable presumption arises that the employee 
was not relieved of duty and no meal period was provided.  This 
is consistent with the policy underlying the meal period 
recording requirement, which was inserted in the IWC’s various 
wage orders to permit enforcement.  (See, e.g., IWC board for 
wage order No. 7-63 meeting mins. (Dec. 14–15, 1966) pp. 4–5 
[rejecting proposal to eliminate the meal period recording 
requirement because ‘without the recording of all in-and-out 
time, including meal periods, the enforcement staff would be 
unable to adequately investigate and enforce’ a wage order’s 
meal period provisions].)  An employer’s assertion that it did 
relieve the employee of duty, but the employee waived the 
opportunity to have a work-free break, is not an element that a 
plaintiff must disprove as part of the plaintiff’s case-in-chief.  
Rather, . . . the assertion is an affirmative defense, and thus the 
burden is on the employer, as the party asserting waiver, to 
plead and prove it.”  (Brinker, supra, 53 Cal.4th at pp. 1052–
1053 (conc. opn. of Werdegar, J.).)   
Justice Werdegar added:  “As the Division of Labor 
Standards Enforcement (DLSE) has explained, even under the 
less restrictive wage order applicable to agricultural employees, 
if ‘a meal period is not taken by the employee, the burden is on 
the employer to show that the agricultural employee had been 
advised of his or her legal right to take a meal period and has 
knowingly and voluntarily decided not to take the meal period.  
Again, we emphasize, the burden is on the employer.’  (Dept. 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
23 
Industrial Relations, DLSE Opn. Letter No. 2003.08.13 (Aug. 
13, 2003) p. 2 [interpreting IWC wage order No. 14 (Cal. Code 
Regs., tit. 8, § 11140)].)  To place the burden elsewhere would 
offer an employer an incentive to avoid its recording duty and a 
potential windfall from the failure to record meal periods.  Both 
the United States Supreme Court and the courts of this state 
have rejected such an approach.  (See Anderson v. Mt. Clemens 
Pottery Co. (1946) 328 U.S. 680, 686–688 [where an employer is 
subject to a recordkeeping requirement, the burden shifts to 
that employer to rebut employee proof of monies owed once a 
prima facie case has been made]; Ghazaryan v. Diva Limousine, 
Ltd. (2008) 169 Cal.App.4th 1524, 1536, fn. 11 [refusing to allow 
an employer to use any shortcomings in its records to resist 
employee wage claims]; Cicairos v. Summit Logistics, Inc. (2005) 
133 Cal.App.4th 949, 961 [‘ “[W]here the employer has failed to 
keep records required by statute, the consequences for such 
failure should fall on the employer, not the employee.” ’].)”  
(Brinker, supra, 53 Cal.4th at p. 1053, fn. 1 (conc. opn. of 
Werdegar, J.).) 
The term “waiver,” as Justice Werdegar used it, should not 
be confused with the “waived” meal period that Labor Code 
section 512, subdivision (a), authorizes only under limited 
circumstances.  We understand an employee’s “waiver” in this 
context in the colloquial sense that the employee chose to work 
when he or she was not required.  We do not suggest that 
employees have the unilateral option — without regard for the 
waiver 
requirements 
in 
Labor 
Code 
section 
512, 
subdivision (a) — to waive their employer’s obligation to relieve 
them from duty and from employer control for a 30-minute meal 
period within the required timeframe.  (See Brinker, supra, 53 
Cal.4th at pp. 1039–1040 & fn. 19.) 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
24 
After Brinker, various Courts of Appeal have cited 
approvingly to Justice Werdegar’s analysis of the rebuttable 
presumption issue.  (See, e.g., Carrington v. Starbucks Corp. 
(2018) 30 Cal.App.5th 504, 527; ABM Industries Overtime Cases 
(2017) 19 Cal.App.5th 277, 311; Lubin v. Wackenhut Corp. 
(2016) 5 Cal.App.5th 926, 951; Safeway, Inc. v. Superior Court 
(2015) 238 Cal.App.4th 1138, 1159–1160; Bradley v. Networkers 
Internat., LLC (2012) 211 Cal.App.4th 1129, 1144–1145.)  We 
now adopt her discussion of the rebuttable presumption in full. 
As Justice Werdegar explained, an employer’s assertion 
that an employee waived a meal period “is not an element that 
a plaintiff must disprove as part of the plaintiff’s case-in-chief.”  
(Brinker, supra, 53 Cal.4th at p. 1053 (conc. opn. of Werdegar, 
J.).)  Instead, the assertion is “an affirmative defense,” and “the 
burden is on the employer, as the party asserting waiver, to 
plead and prove it.”  (Ibid.)  The “plaintiff’s case-in-chief” and 
the “affirmative defense” refer to the merits of the case.  
Contrary to AMN’s argument, the presumption goes to the 
question of liability and applies at the summary judgment stage, 
not just at the class certification stage. 
Moreover, AMN is incorrect that the presumption applies 
only to records showing missed meal periods; the presumption 
applies to records showing short and delayed meal periods as 
well.  Providing employees with short or delayed meal periods is 
just as much a violation of the meal period provisions as failing 
to provide employees with a meal period at all.   
The rationale underlying the rebuttable presumption 
supports these conclusions.  The presumption derives from an 
employer’s duty to maintain accurate records of meal periods.  
(Brinker, supra, 53 Cal.4th at p. 1053 (conc. opn. of Werdegar, 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
25 
J.); Wage Order No. 4, § 7(A)(3) [“Every employer shall keep 
accurate information with respect to each employee . . . .  [¶] . . . 
[¶] . . .  Meal periods . . . shall also be recorded.”].)  It is 
important that employers keep accurate records so that 
enforcement agencies can “ ‘adequately investigate and enforce’ 
a wage order’s meal period provisions.”  (Brinker, at p. 1053 
(conc. opn. of Werdegar, J.).)  Because time records are required 
to be accurate, it makes sense to apply a rebuttable presumption 
of liability when records show noncompliant meal periods.  If the 
records are accurate, then the records reflect an employer’s true 
liability; applying the presumption would not adversely affect 
an employer that has complied with meal period requirements 
and has maintained accurate records.  If the records are 
incomplete or inaccurate — for example, the records do not 
clearly indicate whether the employee chose to work during 
meal periods despite bona fide relief from duty — then the 
employer can offer evidence to rebut the presumption.  It is 
appropriate to place the burden on the employer to plead and 
prove, as an affirmative defense, that it genuinely relieved 
employees from duty during meal periods.  (Ibid.)  “To place the 
burden elsewhere would offer an employer an incentive to avoid 
its recording duty and a potential windfall from the failure to 
record meal periods.”  (Id. at p. 1053, fn. 1.)  “ ‘ “[W]here the 
employer has failed to keep records required by statute, the 
consequences for such failure should fall on the employer, not 
the employee.” ’ ”  (Ibid.) 
In addition, we reject AMN’s argument that applying the 
presumption at the summary judgment stage would eviscerate 
the rule that employers need not police meal periods.  In 
Brinker, we said that an “employer satisfies [meal period] 
obligation[s] if it relieves its employees of all duty, relinquishes 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
26 
control over their activities and permits them a reasonable 
opportunity to take an uninterrupted 30-minute break, and does 
not impede or discourage them from doing so. . . .  [¶]  . . . [T]he 
employer is not obligated to police meal breaks and ensure no 
work thereafter is performed.  Bona fide relief from duty and the 
relinquishing of control satisfies the employer’s obligations, and 
work by a relieved employee during a meal break does not 
thereby place the employer in violation of its obligations and 
create liability for premium pay . . . .”  (Brinker, supra, 53 
Cal.4th at pp. 1040–1041.)  In AMN’s view, applying the 
presumption at the summary judgment stage means that time 
records showing missed, short, or delayed meal periods create 
“automatic liability” for employers.  According to AMN, this 
would leave employers with two options for avoiding liability:  
Employers could monitor every meal period and ensure no work 
is performed, or employers could eliminate flexible meal period 
policies and punish employees for choosing to work during 
scheduled meal periods.  AMN says both options are 
inconsistent with Brinker, which does not require employers to 
police meal periods and allows employees to voluntarily work 
during meal periods. 
AMN misunderstands how the rebuttable presumption 
operates at the summary judgment stage.  Applying the 
presumption does not mean that time records showing missed, 
short, or delayed meal periods result in “automatic liability” for 
employers.  If time records show missed, short, or delayed meal 
periods with no indication of proper compensation, then a 
rebuttable presumption arises.  Employers can rebut the 
presumption by presenting evidence that employees were 
compensated for noncompliant meal periods or that they had in 
fact been provided compliant meal periods during which they 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
27 
chose to work.  “Representative testimony, surveys, and 
statistical analysis,” along with other types of evidence, “are 
available as tools to render manageable determinations of the 
extent of liability.”  (Brinker, supra, 53 Cal.4th at p. 1054 (conc. 
opn. of Werdegar, J.).)  Altogether, this evidence presented at 
summary judgment may reveal that there are no triable issues 
of material fact.  The rebuttable presumption does not require 
employers to police meal periods.  Instead, it requires employers 
to give employees a mechanism for recording their meal periods 
and to ensure that employees use the mechanism properly. 
The court in Silva v. See’s Candy Shops, Inc. (2016) 7 
Cal.App.5th 235, 253–254 (See’s Candy II) concluded that the 
rebuttable presumption is inapplicable when reviewing a 
motion for summary judgment as opposed to a motion for class 
certification.  Similarly, the court in Serrano v. Aerotek, Inc. 
(2018) 21 Cal.App.5th 773 “specifically reject[ed] [the plaintiff’s] 
contention that ‘time records show[ing] late and missed meal 
periods creat[ed] a presumption of violations,’ ” even though 
that plaintiff’s time records had shown “that on several days on 
which she worked more than six hours, she took her meal breaks 
more than five hours after beginning work or, in a couple of 
instances, did not take a meal break at all.”  (Id. at pp. 781, 778.)  
We disapprove Silva v. See’s Candy Shops, Inc., supra, 7 
Cal.App.5th 235, and Serrano v. Aerotek, Inc., supra, 21 
Cal.App.5th 773, to the extent they are inconsistent with this 
opinion. 
We reiterate the rules set forth in Brinker:  An employer 
is liable only if it does not provide an employee with the 
opportunity to take a compliant meal period.  The employer is 
not liable if the employee chooses to take a short or delayed meal 
period or no meal period at all.  The employer is not required to 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
28 
police meal periods to make sure no work is performed.  Instead, 
the employer’s duty is to ensure that it provides the employee 
with bona fide relief from duty and that this is accurately 
reflected in the employer’s time records.  Otherwise, the 
employer must pay the employee premium wages for any 
noncompliant meal period.  (See Brinker, supra, 53 Cal.4th at 
pp. 1040–1041.)  If time records show noncompliant meal 
periods, then a rebuttable presumption of liability arises.  This 
presumption applies at the summary judgment stage, and the 
employer may rebut the presumption with evidence of bona fide 
relief from duty or proper compensation.  Employers may use a 
timekeeping system like Team Time to track meal period 
violations as long as the system does not round time punches.  
Team Time included a dropdown menu for employees to indicate 
whether they were provided a compliant meal period but chose 
to work, and the system triggered premium pay for any missed, 
short, or delayed meal periods due to the employer’s 
noncompliance.  Thus, Team Time would have ensured accurate 
tracking of meal period violations if it had simply omitted 
rounding. 
IV. 
We now apply our holdings to the facts of this case.  We 
conclude that AMN improperly used rounded time punches to 
track potentially noncompliant meal periods.  Before September 
2012, when Team Time records showed a missed meal period or 
a meal period that was shorter than 30 minutes or taken after 
five hours of work, AMN assumed a meal period violation and 
paid the employee a premium wage.  This system may have 
resulted in some overcompensation because AMN gave 
employees premium pay regardless of whether they voluntarily 
chose to work during an off-duty meal period.  But this system 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
29 
did not properly account for meal periods that were short or 
delayed based on actual time punches but did not appear as 
short or delayed under the rounding policy.  AMN would be 
liable for premium pay for any instances in which employees did 
not voluntarily choose to shorten or delay those meal periods. 
After September 2012, when an employee recorded a 
missed, short, or delayed meal period, a dropdown menu 
appeared on Team Time.  The dropdown menu prompted the 
employee to choose one of three options:  (1) “I was provided an 
opportunity to take a 30 min break before the end of my 5th hour 
of work but chose not to”; (2) “I was provided an opportunity to 
take a 30 min break before the end of my 5th hour of work but 
chose to take a shorter/later break”; (3) “I was not provided an 
opportunity to take a 30 min break before the end of my 5th hour 
of work.”  This system also did not properly account for meal 
periods that were short or delayed based on unrounded as 
opposed to rounded time punches.  The dropdown menu did not 
appear for such meal periods.  If any of those meal periods were 
not voluntarily shortened or delayed, then AMN would be liable 
for premium pay. 
The Court of Appeal reached the opposite conclusion as to 
the rounding policy before and after September 2012 and ruled 
in favor of AMN.  We reverse the Court of Appeal’s judgment as 
to the meal period claim and remand with directions to remand 
the matter to the trial court to permit either party to file a new 
summary adjudication motion as to the meal period claim.  (See 
TRB Investments, supra, 40 Cal.4th at pp. 23, 31–32.)  Because 
the parties did not have the benefit of this decision when 
litigating the defendant’s summary judgment motion and the 
plaintiff’s summary adjudication motion, they should now be 
afforded another opportunity to present relevant evidence 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
30 
concerning AMN’s compliance with Brinker.  As to the meal 
periods that are short or delayed based on unrounded time 
punches and for which no premium wages were paid, did the 
employees voluntarily choose to take short or delayed meal 
periods?  On remand, the parties will have the opportunity to 
present evidence bearing on this question. 
We provide some guidance on how the rebuttable 
presumption should be applied on remand in light of the usual 
summary adjudication standards.  According to Donohue’s 
expert witness, AMN’s time records showed 40,110 short meal 
periods and 6,651 delayed meal periods for which premium 
wages were not paid; these meal periods did not show up as 
short or delayed in AMN’s timekeeping system because of 
rounding.  The introduction of these time records by either party 
would trigger the rebuttable presumption.  If AMN renews its 
motion for summary adjudication, it must satisfy the initial 
burden of production and make a prima facie showing that “one 
or more elements of the cause of action . . . cannot be 
established, or that there is a complete defense to the cause of 
action.”  (Code Civ. Proc., § 437c, subd. (p)(2).)  To satisfy this 
burden, AMN could try to establish the defense that it genuinely 
relieved employees from duty during meal periods.  Specifically, 
to rebut the presumption of noncompliance arising from the 
time records, AMN would need to provide evidence that 
employees voluntarily chose to work during off-duty meal 
periods that appear in time records to be short or delayed based 
on unrounded time punches.  If AMN satisfies this burden, then 
the burden of production shifts to Donohue “to show that a 
triable issue of one or more material facts exists as to the cause 
of action or a defense.”  (Ibid.)  But the ultimate burden of 
persuasion remains with the defendant to show that no genuine 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
31 
issue of material fact exists and that it is entitled to judgment 
as a matter of law. 
Conversely, when a plaintiff moves for summary 
adjudication, the plaintiff meets “his or her burden of showing 
that there is no defense to a cause of action” if the plaintiff 
“prove[s] each element of the cause of action entitling the party 
to judgment on the cause of action.”  (Code Civ. Proc., § 437c, 
subd. (p)(1).)  Donohue can satisfy that burden by using time 
records to raise a rebuttable presumption of meal period 
violations.  Once the plaintiff meets that burden, the burden 
shifts to the defendant “to show that a triable issue of one or 
more material facts exists as to the cause of action or a defense.”  
(Ibid.)  But the plaintiff bears the ultimate burden of persuasion 
to show that no genuine issue of material fact exists and that it 
is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.  The parties may 
present new evidence and arguments to address these issues on 
remand. 
According to AMN, it has already established that the 
time records do not raise a rebuttable presumption of meal 
period violations.  AMN argues that Donohue never used Team 
Time’s dropdown menu to indicate that she was not provided 
with a compliant meal period, which suggests that she was 
never denied a compliant meal period.  But because the 
dropdown menu was triggered by rounded time punches, this 
evidence does not encompass all meal periods that were short or 
delayed based on actual time punches.  Thus, AMN cannot rely 
on this evidence to prove that there were no meal period 
violations. 
AMN also contends that the biweekly certifications signed 
by Donohue and other class members show that there were no 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
32 
meal period violations.  Those certifications stated:  “I was 
provided the opportunity to take all meal breaks to which I was 
entitled, or, if not, I have reported on this timesheet that I was 
not provided the opportunity to take all such meal breaks.”  
Donohue argues that AMN cannot rely on the certifications to 
prove that there were no meal period violations.  Because the 
Team Time dropdown menu was triggered by rounded time 
punches, the system did not flag meal periods that were short or 
delayed based on unrounded as opposed to rounded time 
punches.  As a result, Donohue contends, employees would not 
have known about the potentially noncompliant meal periods 
that Team Time did not flag unless they kept their own time 
records.  According to Donohue, Team Time thus led to the 
systematic underreporting of noncompliant meal periods and 
caused the biweekly certifications to be inaccurate.  In addition, 
Donohue argues that the significance of the certifications should 
be discounted because employees had to sign them to get paid. 
We leave these issues for the parties and the trial court to 
address on remand.  We note that if, as Donohue contends, 
employees 
would 
not 
have 
known 
about 
potentially 
noncompliant meal periods that Team Time did not flag unless 
they kept their own time records, then the certifications would 
be inaccurate and cannot be used to prove that there were no 
meal period violations.  It is the employer’s duty to maintain 
accurate time records; the law does not expect or require 
employees to keep their own time records to uncover potential 
meal period violations.  (Wage Order No. 4, § 7(A)(3).) 
DONOHUE v. AMN SERVICES, LLC 
Opinion of the Court by Liu, J. 
33 
CONCLUSION 
 
We reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeal with 
directions to remand to the trial court for further proceedings 
consistent with this opinion. 
 
LIU, J. 
 
We Concur: 
CANTIL-SAKAUYE, C. J. 
CORRIGAN, J. 
CUÉLLAR, J. 
KRUGER, J. 
GROBAN, J. 
HOFFSTADT, J.* 
 
*  
Associate Justice of the Court of Appeal, Second Appellate 
District, Division Two, assigned by the Chief Justice pursuant 
to article VI, section 6 of the California Constitution. 
 
 
See next page for addresses and telephone numbers for counsel who argued in Supreme Court. 
 
Name of Opinion  Donohue v. AMN Services, LLC   
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Unpublished Opinion 
Original Appeal 
Original Proceeding  
Review Granted XXX 29 Cal.App.5th 1068   
Rehearing Granted 
 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Opinion No. S253677 
Date Filed:  February 25, 2021 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Court:  Superior    
County:  San Diego    
Judge:  Joel M. Pressman    
 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Counsel: 
 
Sullivan Law Group, William B. Sullivan, Eric K. Yaeckel, Clint S. Engleson; Niddrie Addams Fuller 
Singh and Rupa G. Singh for Plaintiff and Appellant. 
 
Cohelan Khoury & Singer and Michael D. Singer for California Employment Lawyers Association as 
Amicus Curiae on behalf of Plaintiff and Appellant. 
 
H. Scott Leviant and Dennis F. Moss for Moon & Yang, APC, Clients of Moon & Yang, APC, and Moss 
Bollinger LLP as Amici Curiae on behalf of Plaintiff and Appellant. 
 
DLA Piper, Mary C. Dollarhide and Betsey Boutelle for Defendant and Respondent.  
 
Jones Day, George S. Howard, Cindi L. Ritchey and Raymond W. Duer for Employers Group and 
California Employment Law Council as Amici Curiae on behalf of Defendant and Respondent. 
 
 
 
 
 
Counsel who argued in Supreme Court (not intended for publication with opinion): 
 
William B. Sullivan 
Sullivan Law Group, APC 
2330 Third Avenue 
San Diego, CA 92101 
(619) 702-6760 
 
Eric K. Yaeckel 
Sullivan Law Group, APC 
2330 Third Avenue 
San Diego, CA 92101 
(619) 702-6760 
 
Mary Dollarhide 
DLA Piper LLP (US) 
4365 Executive Drive, Suite 1100 
San Diego, CA 92121 
(858) 677-1400