Opinion ID: 4517909
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: “Report for Work”

Text: The parties dispute, in this interlocutory appeal, whether “report for work” under subsection (5)(A) of Wage Order 7 includes calling one’s manager thirty minutes to one hour before a scheduled shift, as Herrera argues it does. Zumiez argues that one can only “report for work” in person and therefore only an employee’s physical presence may trigger the reporting time pay requirement. The California Court of Appeal resolved this dispute in Ward. First, the California Court of Appeal considered the plain language of Wage Order 7 and determined that “the text of Wage Order 7, alone, is not determinative of the question.” 243 Cal. Rptr. 3d at 468. In Wage Order 7, “report for work” is not modified by terms such as “physically” or “at the workplace.” Cal. Code Regs. tit. 8, HERRERA V. ZUMIEZ, INC. 17 § 11070(5)(A). Ward recognized that dictionary definitions of “report” point in both directions. 243 Cal. Rptr. 3d at 468–69. Some definitions “have a spatial element,” suggesting physical presence; whereas other definitions “focus on the reporter’s intent, rather than his or her location.” Id. (emphasis in original); see also Report, Oxford Living Dictionaries: English, available at https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/report (last visited Sept. 27, 2019) (defining “report” as to “[p]resent oneself formally as having arrived at a particular place or as ready to do something”) (emphasis added). Zumiez argues that the definition of “work” is “the place where one is employed,” so “report for work” means physically showing up at that place. Zumiez acknowledges, however, that work has other common meanings, such as “activity in which one exerts strength or faculties to do or perform.” Because one can report to a place or for a task, Ward found that the plain language of the text remains susceptible to more than one meaning, making the language alone therefore not dispositive. There is no persuasive basis for believing that the California Supreme Court would decide otherwise. See Am. Tel. & Tel. Co., 311 U.S. at 237. Second, the California Court of Appeal turned to the regulatory history and purpose of the reporting time pay provision of Wage Order 7. Ward, 243 Cal. Rptr. 3d at 469– 75. The court concluded that at the time that Wage Order 7 was enacted—in 1943—telephonic reporting had not been contemplated, but that “[t]he contemporaneous understanding of ‘report for work’ is not dispositive.” 4 Id. 4 Zumiez argues that the California Court of Appeal erred in concluding that statutory interpretation principles allow for “evolutionary arguments,” citing to New Prime Inc. v. Oliveira, 139 18 HERRERA V. ZUMIEZ, INC. at 469. Instead, the California Supreme Court “constru[es] statutes that predate their possible applicability to new practices or technology,” id. (quoting Apple, 292 P.3d at 887), by determining “how the [enacting body] would have handled the problem if it had anticipated it.” Id. (quoting People v. Butler, 451 Cal. Rptr. 2d 150, 151 (Ct. App. 1996)). Accordingly, the California Court of Appeal looked to the history and purpose of Wage Order 7’s reporting time pay requirement and found the history “reveals . . . that the IWC’s purpose in adopting reporting time pay requirements was two-fold: to ‘compensate employees’ and ‘encourage proper notice and scheduling.’” Id. at 472–72 (quoting Murphy, 155 P.3d at 295) (alteration omitted). Therefore, the California Court of Appeal determined, “had the IWC considered the issue, it would have concluded that telephonic call-in requirements trigger reporting time pay.” Id. at 473. In reaching this conclusion, Ward drew a straight line from determinations made by the IWC in 1942 and 1943 to the applicability of reporting time pay to call-in scheduling practices today. In 1942, reporting time pay requirements were contemplated as “a penalty” for employers who arranged “to have plenty of workers around for all emergencies” without pay; the premise of the requirements S. Ct. 532, 539 (2019), and J.L. v. Mercer Island Sch. Dist., 592 F.3d 938, 950 (9th Cir. 2010). But federal principles of statutory interpretation cannot replace state principles of statutory interpretation. Those cases involved federal subject matter jurisdiction whereas here, we have diversity jurisdiction. We are guided by how the California Supreme Court would interpret a California wage order. CPR for Skid Row, 779 F.3d at 1104. “Under California law, the ‘fundamental task’ of statutory interpretation is ‘to determine the [enacting body’s] intent so as to effectuate the law’s purpose.’” Id. (quoting People v. Cornett, 274 P.3d 456, 458 (Cal. 2012)). HERRERA V. ZUMIEZ, INC. 19 was that “[a]llowing a large number of workers to come to the plant when there is little or no work for them is serious abuse.” Id. at 471–72 (citing Kidd, Chairman, Comment on the Rep. of the Wage Bd. for the Canning and Preserving Industries (July 21, 1942)). In 1943, the year that a reporting time pay requirement was added to Wage Order 7, a reporting time pay requirement was also added to the wage order governing the housekeeping industry. Id. With respect to that wage order, the IWC considered—and rejected—“an employer request that employees who resided at the workplace be paid” fewer hours of reporting time pay because such employees did not lose time traveling to and from their workplace. Id. Accordingly, the California Court of Appeal reasoned in Ward, the contemporary call-in practice “ha[s] much in common with the specific abuse the IWC sought to combat by enacting a reporting time pay requirement,” because it “creates no incentive for employers to competently anticipate their labor needs and to schedule accordingly.” Id. at 473. “Like requiring employees to come to a workplace at the start of a shift without a guarantee of work, unpaid on-call shifts . . . create a large pool of contingent workers whom the employer can call on if a store’s foot traffic warrants it, or can tell not to come in if it does not, without any financial consequence to the employers.” Id. At the same time, even where no transportation cost or significant lost time is incurred, in both the on-site and call-in shift situations, there are “tremendous costs on employees” because, among other things, “they cannot commit to other jobs or schedule classes during those shifts” and “must make contingent childcare or elder care arrangements, which they may have to pay for even if they are not [permitted] to work.” Id. Therefore, Ward concluded, “[A]n employee need not necessarily physically appear at the workplace to ‘report for 20 HERRERA V. ZUMIEZ, INC. work.’ Instead, ‘report[ing] for work’ within the meaning of the wage order is best understood as presenting oneself as ordered. ‘Report for work,’ in other words . . . is defined by the party who directs the manner in which the employee is to present himself or herself for work—that is, by the employer.” Id. at 475. Zumiez’s two principle arguments to the contrary were addressed by the California Court of Appeal and determined to be unavailing. Zumiez first argues that the purpose of reporting time pay is to compensate employees for the transportation costs of arriving at work, citing to IWC statements and meeting minutes from the 1940s, 1960s, and 1970s, as well as DLSE policy manuals and opinion letters. While avoiding the cost of transportation was one motivating factor, it was never the only one; the IWC explicitly found that reporting time pay was necessary “in order to compensate the employee for transportation costs and loss of time.” Indus. Welfare Comm’n, Minutes of a Meeting of the Industrial Welfare Commission of the State of California Held Apr. 5, 1943 (1943). Ward squarely addressed the “suggestion that reporting time pay was intended only to compensate employees for travel time and expense,” and rejected it, reasoning that the argument [could not] be squared with the exception in the reporting time pay provision for shifts cancelled for reasons beyond the employer’s control. This exception makes sense only if reporting time pay was intended to impose a penalty for overscheduling—not if reporting time pay was intended only to compensate employees for travel time and expense. Put simply, employees’ travel time and expenses HERRERA V. ZUMIEZ, INC. 21 are not reduced because the employer has a good reason for canceling a shift. Ward, 243 Cal. Rptr. 3d at 475. Zumiez and Abercrombie & Fitch Stores, Inc., appearing as an amicus curiae, next highlight that phone technology existed in 1943 and yet the wage order does not mention phones. The California Court of Appeal rejected this argument also. Id. at 470 (“[A]n omission [of mention of telephonic reporting in Wage Order 7] is not surprising because neither the practice of on-call scheduling nor the cell phone technology that makes such scheduling possible existed when the IWC adopted the reporting time pay requirement in the 1940s.”) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). Ward rejected Zumiez’s (and amicus’s) historical argument and there is no “persuasive data,” Am. Tel. & Tel. Co., 311 U.S. at 237, to suggest the California Supreme Court would reach a different conclusion concerning the regulatory history and purpose of Wage Order 7. Third, the California Court of Appeal in Ward recognized that its conclusion about reporting time pay for call-in shifts is consistent with Augustus, 385 P.3d 823, a recent California Supreme Court decision. Ward, 243 Cal. Rptr. 3d at 475–77. There, the California Supreme Court held that a policy in which employees were required to carry a device, such as a pager or cell phone, during their breaks so that they could be reached by their employer was “irreconcilable with employees’ retention of freedom to use rest periods for their own purposes,” and did not satisfy the wage order’s rest period requirement. Augustus, 385 P.3d at 832. Although Augustus addressed rest periods, not reporting time pay, the California Court of Appeal’s reliance on Augustus is pertinent to our prediction concerning whether the California Supreme Court is likely to disagree 22 HERRERA V. ZUMIEZ, INC. with Ward. See Ward, 243 Cal. Rptr. 3d at 477. As alleged by Herrera, Zumiez’s Call-In shift practice imposes similar significant restrictions on employees’ off-duty time to those in Augustus, by limiting “how employees can use their time . . . [30 minutes] before an on-call shift, when they must be available to contact [Zumiez].” Id. Fourth, the California Court of Appeal considered the retail employer’s public policy arguments and found them unpersuasive. Ward, 243 Cal. Rptr. 3d at 477–79. One of the policy arguments considered by the California Court of Appeal is also argued here: that unsuccessful bills the California Legislature considered during the 2015-16 session would have provided the relief that Herrera seeks. See S.B. 878, 2015-16 Reg. Sess. (Cal. 2016); Assemb. B. 357, 2015-16 Reg. Sess. (Cal. 2015). That the Legislature considered bills to address the issue of pay for Call-In shifts, Zumiez argues, shows that the existing wage order does not include pay for such shifts through the reporting time pay provision. The majority in Ward was unpersuaded by the policy argument based on unsuccessful bills for two reasons: first, “[t]he proposed legislation went further than the reporting time pay provision of Wage Order 7,” and therefore would not have been unnecessarily duplicative of this construction of the reporting time pay provision; and, second, before the decision in Ward, federal district courts “ha[d] split over the applicability of Wage Order 7 to on-call shifts,” and the legislature may have wanted to resolve the uncertainty. 5 243 Cal. Rptr. 3d at 479. Ward also acknowledged a third, related reason to reject the argument resting on unsuccessful bills, which we also find compelling: unenacted bills are of “little value” to 5 See supra n.3. HERRERA V. ZUMIEZ, INC. 23 courts. Sacramento Newspaper Guild v. Sacramento Cty. Bd. of Supervisors, 69 Cal. Rptr. 480, 492 (Ct. App. 1968) (“The light shed by such unadopted proposals is too dim to pierce statutory obscurities.”); see also Rucho v. Common Cause, 139 S. Ct. 2484, 2524 (2019) (Kagan, J., dissenting) (“[W]hat all these bills have in common is that they are not laws.”); Cal. Chamber of Commerce v. State Air Res. Bd., 216 Cal. Rptr. 3d 694, 713 (Ct. App. 2017) (recognizing there are “limited circumstances under which an unenacted bill is relevant”). Arguments based on unenacted bills are unpersuasive because we do not know why a specific bill was not passed. A legislature can decide not to enact a bill because it disagreed with that proposal. But there are a host of other reasons why a legislature may not enact a bill, including that the legislature thought the bill superfluous given existing law. Again, we are unpersuaded that the California Supreme Court would reach a different conclusion than did Ward with regard to Zumiez’s argument concerning the recent unsuccessful bill. Am. Tel. & Tel. Co., 311 U.S. at 237. In sum, following Ward, we conclude that, under subsection (5)(A) of Wage Order 7, a requirement that employees call their manager thirty minutes to one hour before a scheduled shift constitutes “report[ing] for work.” Here, Herrera has alleged that she was scheduled for a shift, expected to work, incurred costs or arranged her other obligations and planned activities to make herself available, and then was not permitted to work. See Ward, 243 Cal. 24 HERRERA V. ZUMIEZ, INC. Rptr. 3d at 473–74. The district court correctly determined that Herrera has stated a claim for reporting time pay. 6