Maximum Hours in a day

Is there a requirement identified under state (specifically NY state) or federal labor laws that limits the maximum number of hours that an employee can work in a day? I understand the requirements on paying overtime. Other than the obvious issue of potential safety hazards of overworking someone, I am wondering if there is a legal requirement that limits how many hours we can work an employee in a 24 hour period (ie. 14 hours, 16 hours,).

Comments

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  • Federal FLSA does not cover this. Ny state has this law. One day rest out of seven:

    § 161. One day rest in seven




    1. Every employer operating a factory, mercantile establishment, hotel, restaurant, or freight or passenger elevator in any building or place shall, except as herein otherwise provided, allow every person employed in such establishment or in the care, custody or operation of any such elevator, at least twenty-four consecutive hours of rest in any calendar week. Every employer operating a place in which motion pictures are shown shall allow the projectionist or operator of the motion picture machine and engineers and firemen therein at least twenty-four consecutive hours of rest in any calendar week. Every employer operating a place in which legitimate theatre productions such as dramatic and musical productions are shown or exhibited shall allow all employees, including the performers in the cast therein and engineers and firemen, at least twenty-four consecutive hours of rest in each and every calendar week, but this shall not apply to any place wherein motion pictures, vaudeville or incidental stage presentations or a combination thereof are regularly given throughout the week as the established policy of such place; except that engineers and firemen employed in such place shall be allowed at least twenty-four consecutive hours of rest in any calendar week. No employer shall operate such establishment, place or elevator on Sunday unless he shall comply with subdivision three. This section does not authorize any work on Sunday not permitted now or hereafter by law.

    Every owner, lessee and operator of a dwelling, apartment, loft and office building, garage, storage place and building, wherein or whereat a watchman or watchmen or engineer or fireman are employed, shall allow such person or persons so employed at least twenty-four consecutive hours of rest in each and every calendar week.

    Every owner, lessee or operator of a warehouse, storagehouse, office, dwelling, apartment, loft and any other building or structure wherein a janitor, superintendent, supervisor or manager or engineer or fireman is employed, shall allow such person or persons so employed at least twenty-four consecutive hours of rest in each and every calendar week.

    2. This section shall not apply to:

    a. Foreman in charge;

    b. Employees in dairies, creameries, milk condenseries, milk powder factories, milk sugar factories, milk shipping stations, butter and cheese factories, ice cream manufacturing plants and milk bottling plants, where not more than seven persons are employed;

    c. Employees, if the board in its discretion approves, engaged in an industrial or manufacturing process necessarily continuous, in which no employee is permitted to work more than eight hours in any calendar day;

    d. Employees whose duties include not more than three hours' work on Sunday in setting sponges in bakeries, caring for live animals, maintaining fires, or making necessary repairs to boilers or machinery.

    e. Employees in resort or seasonal hotels and restaurants in rural communities and in cities and villages having a population of less than fifteen thousand inhabitants, excluding that portion of the population of a third class city residing outside of its corporation tax district where such city embraces the entire area of a former township. As used in this subdivision, the term "resort" shall apply to any establishment enumerated herein which operates for not more than four calendar months and fifteen days in each year, and the term "seasonal" shall apply to any establishment enumerated herein in which the number of employees is increased by at least one hundred per cent from the slack to the busiest season.

    f. Employees in dry dock plants engaged in making repairs to ships.

    3. Before operating on Sunday, every employer shall designate a day of rest, consisting of at least twenty-four consecutive hours of rest in each and every calendar week for each employee, and shall notify each employee in advance of his or her designated day of rest. No employee shall be permitted to work on his designated day of rest.

    4. Every employer shall keep a time book showing the names and addresses of his employees and the hours worked by each of them in each day.

    5. If there shall be practical difficulties or unnecessary hardship in carrying out the provisions of this section or the rules promulgated hereunder, the commissioner may make a variation therefrom if the spirit of the act be observed and substantial justice done. Such variation shall describe the conditions under which it shall be permitted and shall apply to substantially similar conditions. A properly indexed record of variations shall be kept by the department. Each application for a variation shall be accompanied by a non-refundable fee of twenty-five dollars.

    6. In case of violation of any of the provisions of this section, the commissioner shall issue an order directing compliance therewith, and upon failure so to comply shall commence a prosecution as provided by law.


    I saw nothing regarding the number of hours worked per day.


  • Tell me this is not still the law in NY! This has to be a very old, no longer enforced provision. The old CPA was correct:at least for purposes of the FLSA, 24 hours is the only max.
  • I'm pretty sure it is still a law. On the search engine I use, it will have a "repealed" notation next to the laws that are void.

    I have this picture in my head of 14,999 villagers running through the village demanding a day off. Of course they are armed with pitchforks and torches.
  • I saw nothing exempting the shovelers of sh*t on the earthen passageways within the city limits or those who board and groom horses while their masters are inside saloons.
  • Back in the day, as a young CPA, my audit partner always said he would never work us more than 24 hours in a day --- unless it was busy season.x;-)
  • That's awesome, marc! Hope it was listed with the rest of your benefits!
  • Yesterday morning employee reported for work and observed co-worker who was already at desk and appeared to have been working for quite some time. Co-worker commented that he had been working 18 hours straight. Arriving employee went to supervisor who came over to "all-nighter" and told him to go home. "You know the max is 16." Don't know where the number came from, but probably company policy. I'm checking into it and will post with findings.

  • [font size="1" color="#FF0000"]LAST EDITED ON 10-20-04 AT 08:18AM (CST)[/font][br][br]I was just researching this info for our FL plant. The ee said 12 hours, the team coach said 16 hours and the fact of the matter is there is no law regarding continuous number of hours worked in FL. Generally these arbitrary rules start because one person stood up and said this is the rule and everyone believes them. I did a quick search for DE and found no state laws regarding number of hours worked.

    edit
    The rule of thumb for our co. is 18 hrs.
  • As a manager of human resources and safety, I can tell you that 18 straight hours of work is insane from a safety and productivity standpoint. Are there any justifications that you can present for that policy?
  • Our shifts are 12 hours, so they are used to long hours already. It is rare that someone will work 18 hrs, but generally it has happend with maintenance when we have a shut down and have to do electrical or other process work. They only have a certain amount of time to get the job done. The other instances it could occur is when we start up a new plant. During construction and machine start-up we can have some maintenance work those hours, again to meet deadlines.

    Gotta go, off to the looney bin.
  • Don: In my world, there are several justifications: major snow storms, multiple water main breaks during cold weather, wind storms, tornados. Unfortunately, there have been numerous times when our employees have worked in excess of 18 hours.
  • Good golly guys! When working municiple public safety I have had a regular 24 hour shift with no sleep breaks on many, many occasions. Working 24 on and 24 off. When I decided to go back to school, my employer allowed me work work 72-hour shifts so I could attend classes and do clincals during the rest of the week. While I don't recommend this for folks, it wasn't illegal - just exhausting.
  • Well, I guess I can do anything for 24 straight hours on occasion (see thread on cialis), but I was commenting on situations where people have 18 hour shifts as a matter of routine. Even medical interns have been taken off some of those insane shift requirements. I don't want no ambulance staffer working on me if s(he)s been up 24 hours and can't hold his/her eyes open!
  • Well, drive safely then, and don't get into any of those four or six hour situations where you need medical attention to bring you down. I believe most full time firefighter/emt/paramedics work some variation of a 24 hour shift.
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