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Sezgin Khousadian LLP Plaintiff's Employment & Labor Law. We specialize in representing employees who have had their right Attorney Advertising

We specialize in representing employees who have had their rights violated by their employers.

10/14/2026

Restaurant and retail workers, let’s talk. Tips shared with the boss. Bags searched on your own time. Sent home after you showed up. California law has rules for all of it.

Your tips belong to you. Employers, owners, managers, and supervisors can’t take any part of them. Tip pools are only allowed among employees who provide direct service, like servers, bussers, and bartenders. And tips can’t be used to cover your minimum wage. Your employer has to pay full minimum wage on top of them.

If the nature of your work reasonably permits it, your employer must provide a suitable seat. Courts look at your tasks one by one, so if some of them, like ringing up customers or folding, could be done sitting, “I’m on my feet all day” doesn’t excuse the employer.

Waiting for and going through a mandatory bag or security check before you leave counts as time worked. If you’re made to clock out first, that’s off-the-clock work you should be paid for.

Being told to hold your time open and call in to find out whether you’re needed isn’t free. Depending on how the on-call shift works, you may be owed pay even if you were never told to come in.

And if you show up for a scheduled shift and get sent home or given less work than planned, you’re generally owed pay for at least half your scheduled shift: a minimum of 2 hours and a maximum of 4 hours at your regular rate.

If you’ve had tips taken, been made to wait on bag checks unpaid, or been sent home with less pay than you should have gotten, you may be owed money.

Contact us for a free consultation:
818-696-1330

10/08/2026

Nurses, listen up! Short-staffed. Skipped breaks. Charting after your shift. “That’s just nursing,” right? Not under California law.

Health care employers can only use an “on-duty” meal break if the nature of the work truly prevents you from being relieved, you signed a written agreement, and you can revoke it at any time. If any of those is missing, the break isn’t valid, and you may be owed premium pay.

A real break is also duty-free. Carrying a phone or pager, staying available for call lights, or being pulled away mid-break doesn’t count.

You earn overtime (1.5x) two ways: working more than 8 hours in a single day, or more than 40 hours in a week. Double-time kicks in after 12 hours in a day.

Watch out for auto-deducted lunches on days you worked through your meal, charting or handoff after your shift ends without pay, interrupted breaks with no premium pay on your stub, time-clock rounding that consistently cuts your pay, and breaks that exist on paper but are impossible to take with your patient load.

And if you’re a nurse or a Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA) in a state-run facility, you generally can’t be forced to work extra hours outside of an emergency, or punished for saying no.

If you’re a nurse who’s rarely gotten a real break or been paid for every hour, you may be owed money.

Contact us for a free consultation: 818-696-1330

Attorney advertising. This post is not legal advice.

10/06/2026

Your child was bullied at school. You reported it. Nothing changed. The school may have failed its legal duty to your child.

California schools have an affirmative duty to take reasonable steps to keep students safe. Under California law, bullying is severe or pervasive conduct, whether physical, verbal, or online, that can reasonably be expected to:
→ Put a student in fear of harm to themselves or their property
→ Substantially harm their physical or mental health
→ Substantially interfere with their schoolwork or school activities

Seth’s Law strengthened these protections by explicitly prohibiting bullying and harassment based on actual or perceived characteristics, including sexual orientation, gender identity, race, religion, disability, and nationality.

California law also requires schools to:
→ Have staff intervene when they witness bullying
→ Adopt and prominently display a written anti-bullying policy
→ Provide a clear process for reporting complaints

That responsibility doesn’t stop with teachers. Principals, administrators, and district leaders all have a duty to protect students.

⏳ Claims against public school districts generally must be filed within 6 months. Waiting for the school to fix it can cost your child their case.

If your child was bullied and the school failed to act, contact us for a free consultation: 818-696-1330.

Attorney advertising. This post is not legal advice.

09/29/2026

Laid off, passed over, or pushed out — and you can’t shake the feeling it’s because of your age? California law may back you up.

Under the FEHA, employees and applicants age 40 and over are protected from age discrimination in hiring, firing, promotions, pay, and layoffs. And it rarely sounds like “you’re too old.” It shows up as comments about your “energy” or “fit,” being called “old school” or not “keeping up with the times,” questions about when you’re planning to retire, being passed over for younger, less experienced candidates, sudden performance issues after years of good reviews, or being excluded from training and growth opportunities.

Age discrimination doesn’t require intent, either. If a layoff or restructuring disproportionately affects older workers — even if it looks neutral on paper — that can still be illegal. Watch for older employees being let go while younger employees in similar roles are kept or hired, or a pattern of “restructuring” that consistently clears out older staff.

If you’re 40+ and asked to sign a severance agreement waiving age discrimination claims, the law entitles you to specific disclosures — including at least 21 days to consider it and 7 days to revoke after signing.

If you think your age played a role in how you were treated at work, you may have a claim. Contact us for a free consultation: 818-696-1330

09/25/2026

Sexual harassment isn’t always obvious, and it’s not just physical.

Under California law, it falls into two categories:
1) Quid Pro Quo - where a job benefit is conditioned on submitting to unwelcome sexual conduct; and
2) Hostile Work Environment - where the conduct is severe or pervasive enough to change your working conditions. This can include unwanted touching, sexual comments or jokes, repeated remarks about your body, explicit messages or images, pressure for dates or romantic relationships, or sexual gestures.

In California, a single incident can be enough if it’s serious enough. Employers are strictly liable for harassment by a supervisor — there’s no “we didn’t know” defense. But for harassment by coworkers, clients, vendors, or other non-employees, employers are only liable if they knew or should have known about it and failed to act.

Employers are required to take real, proactive steps to prevent harassment — clear policies, real training, prompt investigations. And once they learn of harassment, they have to act: investigate promptly, and take corrective action, including removing the harasser while the investigation is ongoing if needed.

If this sounds like what you’re dealing with, you don’t have to handle it alone. Contact us for a free consultation: 818-696-1330

09/18/2026

Let’s talk about California pregnancy disability rights.

Pregnancy Disability Leave (“PDL”) covers the time you’re physically disabled by pregnancy or childbirth — up to 4 months. It applies from the moment you’re disabled as a result of your pregnancy, with no minimum time on the job required. Once you’re medically cleared, the California Family Rights Act (CFRA) provides an additional 12 weeks of bonding leave — separate from and in addition to PDL. Combined, many employees are entitled to well over 4 months of job-protected time off.

Even outside of leave, you’re entitled to reasonable accommodations for pregnancy, such as more frequent breaks, modified duties, a stool or seating, and help with lifting. Your employer is required to engage with you in good faith to figure out what accommodation works.

If you’ve been denied leave, pushed to return early, or denied a reasonable accommodation, that may be illegal — and you don’t have to figure it out alone.

Contact Us for a free consult: 818-696-1330

09/17/2026

Your paycheck stub might be showing you a labor law violation — you just don’t know what to look for.

California requires a 30-minute unpaid meal break for shifts over 5 hours, and paid 10-minute rest breaks for every 4 hours worked. Longer shifts trigger even more: a second meal break past 10 hours and additional rest breaks as your shift grows. If a break is missed, shortened, interrupted, or provided late, your employer owes you an extra hour of pay — per violation, per day.

So what should you actually look for? Check if there’s a line item for “meal period premium” or “rest period premium.” The premium could also be called a penalty. If you missed, worked through, or had shortened breaks — but no premium pay showed up — that’s a red flag. Same if your time sheets show long shifts with no recorded break, and no premium to match. Being required to stay on duty during lunch, or feeling discouraged from taking your breaks at all, are red flags too.

This isn’t just about your paycheck. If your employer has a pattern of skipping premium pay, it may be affecting every employee under the same policy — which is exactly what a PAGA claim is built for.

Start by saving your paycheck stubs and schedules, and also tracking your actual break times if you can.

Call us for free consultation — 818-696-1330

05/15/2026

California employment laws are among the strictest in the nation, governed primarily by the Labor Code and the Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA). They mandate high minimum wage thresholds, strict overtime and meal/rest break rules, comprehensive anti-discrimination and anti-retaliation protections, and robust paid leave.





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