Under the California lunch break law, you can skip meal periods without causing legal issues for your employer, as long as it was your voluntary decision to do so.
Your ability to do this depends on the length of your shift and the understanding you and your employer have. If you don’t work more than six hours, you can skip your meal period.
If you work more than 10 hours, but not more than 12 hours, you can skip your second meal period, but you still have to take your first meal period.
Whatever your shift situation is, you and your employer must agree that you will skip your meal period before you do it.
If you don’t waive your right to uninterrupted meal periods and your employer prevents you from taking them, your employer could owe you one hour’s worth of pay for every meal period you don’t receive.
If you cannot work these payments out with your employer, you can file a civil lawsuit, or you can file a wage claim with the California Department of Industrial Relations.