employee lunch period

[Campesina]

My employees, being paid as normal workers, not hotel workers, work from 8 am until 4:30 pm. They have a half hour for lunch which they eat on property. They have brought a copy of the labor law which states a working day consists of 8 hours. They are insisting lunch is included in that part of the 8 hours.

There is no indication in the law referring to lunch periods. A call to the secretary of trabajo supports the employees view.

My arguement, of course, is they are not "working" during the half hour lunch, therefore the hours should stand as they are 8 am to 4:30.

While I don't mind paying them through their lunch break, my question is just to know if I have to adjust their schedule by half an hour and decide which end of the day I will take it from.

[Criss Colon]

They get 12 noon to 1 pm to "Eat" and then "dooze" inorder to "Baja la Cominda"!
They NEVER work to hard the rest of the day anyway!
My suggestion is to fire them all and start over! See if THAT motivates them!
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[Duece]

I have operated a large business, over 200 employees, for six years. A work day is 7.5 hours for us and lunch is unpaid for 30 minutes, or more if you like, but you do not have to pay for lunch if you work for 7.5 hours. We work 6 days a week, which is a Dominican work week basically 44.50 hours.

[Fabio J. Guzman]

Articles 146 and 151 of the Labor Code:

Art. 146.- A working day ("jornada de trabajo") comprises all the time a worker cannot dispose of freely for being at the service of the employer.

Art. 151.- It is part of the working day and should be compensated with a salary:

1) The time that the worker is at the exclusive service of the employer
2) The time the worker is inactive during the working day, when the inactivity does not depend on him/her...
3) The time required for his meals during the working day, when the nature of the work or the will of the employer require that he stay at the working place

[MrMike]

Interesting, so basically if the employees are free to leave during lunch then they don't get paid, but if they are required to stay on company property then they do need to get paid?

[KateP]

And isn't there something that says that for every 4 hours of work they must have 1 hour o rest? I think I remember reading that a few years back... About the lunch hour, we had problems a while back in Punta Cana because there's no way employees can leave, go home for lunch and come back in 1 hour. So they ended up having to reduce the schedule 1 hour or pay them extra for that hour...

[Campesina]

Thank you very much Sr. Guzman.