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Oregon Employers, it's True - You Must Fire Employees who Skip Lunch
25 May 2023
It's illegal to skip lunch in Oregon. And the State says you need to fire any employees who do so.
OREGON EMPLOYERS:
The good news... I asked a question of the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries (BOLI) regarding lunch break regulations and received a response in about an hour and a half. Great job.
The bad news... Well, I will let you read their response in this linked document
and be the judge of what at least this representative thinks of the Trades, you as employers, and your employees. The only edit I made to the email print out is removing the contact information of this particular representative as it is not (he, him, his) fault... Just someone trying to do their job like the rest of us.
H.R. Guy Analysis: The State of Oregon pretty much demands that if your employees do not clock out for lunch, or if they clock out for less than 30 minutes, you MUST write them up for breaking the law. This would be one of the few times that the traditional progressive discipline approach is called for: 3 strikes and you are out.
If an employee clocks out, you must have some sort of system in place to ensure they are in fact doing no work for that 30+ minutes or you are still liable. If it's discovered that they are clocking out and continuing to work just to avoid the hassle of being written up because they, as an adult, do not want to take a lunch (most common if you are paying piece rate/commissions), you would be best served legally by firing them for fraud immediately.
The only good news I can see in this analysis is that the terminations would be For-Cause, preventing Unemployment benefits, since they are literally breaking the law by skipping lunch and setting you up for a lawsuit at their convenience.
Normally I am a "grey area" type of guy. But State Law and multiple levels of court rulings declare that in Oregon, unlike every other state, employees DO NOT have the legal right to skip their lunch. And the employer is 100% liable under any condition, so there is no grey area to work with. Sorry.
If you would like a copy of the court ruling that is mentioned in the linked document, just let me know.
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