Employers cannot change the time employees clocked in or out without a valid reason. This is true for all nonexempt hourly employees. For example, if the usual work hours are 08:30am-5:00pm, but an employee did not clock out until 5:10 pm to finish a task, it is illegal for an employer to change the clock out time to 5:00pm. That employee is owed wages for that extra 10 minutes. Not paying for time that nonexempt employees worked is wage theft, and when it’s done by altering time records it’s called time shaving.
The same principle applies to meal periods or lunch breaks. Nonexempt employees are entitled to a 30-minute uninterrupted meal break before working a period exceeding five hours. If an employee takes the meal break after the fifth hour, takes less than a full 30 minutes, or does not take a meal break at all, then the employee is entitled to an extra hour of paid time. Also, it’s illegal for an employer to clock the employee out for lunch while the employee during a period when the employee was working. Likewise, an employer cannot instruct the employee to clock out but keep working or alter time sheet records to create false meal break time records to try to avoid paying that extra hour of earned missed meal period wage premium.
However, employers are permitted to change clock in or clock out time records to fix an error that does not accurately show the start and end times of an employee’s work periods. Also, an employee may request for an employer to fix the records because an employee is not stuck with whatever the time records say if the records are inaccurate. But it is best to seek a change as soon as possible and make written request, like in an email.