Camp v. Home Depot: Recorded Minutes, Rounding, and Pending Review

In Camp v. Home Depot U.S.A., Inc. (2022) 84 Cal.App.5th 638, the California Court of Appeal for the Sixth Appellate District addressed a central question in California wage and hour litigation: whether an employer that captures an employee's exact work time in minutes using an electronic timekeeping system may nevertheless adjust those minutes using a quarter-hour rounding policy to pay the employee for less time than actually worked. The appellate court held that where an employer can and does track exact shift minutes, and those records demonstrate that an individual employee was not paid for all time worked, the employer cannot rely on a quarter-hour rounding policy to defeat the employee's statutory claim for unpaid wages.

The Supreme Court granted review on February 1, 2023. Its order permits persuasive citation and citation for the limited purpose of showing a conflict in authority. The court’s October 2, 2026 civil pending-issues list still included S277518. That dated status is essential to reading the Court of Appeal’s reasoning; the reversal was not a final wage award.

Factual Background and Procedural Posture

Plaintiffs Delmer Camp and Adriana Correa filed a putative class action against Home Depot U.S.A., Inc. in Santa Clara County Superior Court (Case No. 19CV344872), alleging causes of action for unpaid minimum and overtime wages under California Labor Code Section 510 and Industrial Welfare Commission (IWC) Wage Order No. 7-2001 (Cal. Code Regs., tit. 8, § 11070), as well as unfair competition under Business and Professions Code Section 17200 et seq.

Home Depot utilized an electronic software system known as Kronos to record hourly employees' time punches. Employees punched in and out on Kronos at the beginning and end of their shifts and for meal breaks. The Kronos system captured each punch to the exact minute. However, for payroll purposes, Home Depot applied a quarter-hour rounding policy to each hourly employee's total shift time:

• Time increments of 7 minutes or less past a quarter-hour were rounded down to the lower quarter-hour.
• Time increments of 8 minutes or more past a quarter-hour were rounded up to the next quarter-hour.

Home Depot moved for summary judgment, arguing that its quarter-hour rounding policy was lawful under See's Candy Shops, Inc. v. Superior Court (2012) 210 Cal.App.4th 889 because it was neutral on its face and neutral as applied over time. In support of its motion, Home Depot presented a stipulated statistical analysis of employee time records covering 13,387 hourly employees, 4,282,517 shifts, and 516,193 pay periods:

• On 56.6% of shifts (over 2.4 million shifts), employees were paid for the same or a greater number of minutes than actual work time due to rounding.
• Employees lost minutes due to rounding on 43.4% of shifts.
• Across all pay periods analyzed, employees gained minutes in 49.2% of pay periods, lost minutes in 47.1%, and had no change in 3.7%.
• In the aggregate, the 10% sample of employees was paid for 339,331 more minutes (5,656 hours) than if Home Depot had paid based on unrounded minutes.

Regarding the individual named plaintiffs, the evidence demonstrated distinct records:

• Adriana Correa: Employed from March 2015 to October 2015. Her time records showed that she did not lose minutes in the aggregate due to rounding, and she conceded in opposition that she was paid for all time worked and could not state an individual claim for unpaid wages.
• Delmer Camp: Employed as a nonexempt associate starting in March 2015. Between March 30, 2015, and October 20, 2020, Camp worked 1,240 shifts. While he gained time on some shifts and lost time on others, he suffered a net total loss of 470 minutes (approximately 7.83 hours) over the 1,240 shifts due to the quarter-hour rounding policy.

The trial court granted summary judgment in favor of Home Depot, finding that its rounding policy satisfied the See's Candy standard and that under Auto Equity Sales, Inc. v. Superior Court (1962) 57 Cal.2d 450, the trial court was bound to apply existing Court of Appeal precedent. Plaintiffs appealed to the Sixth District Court of Appeal (Appeal No. H049033).

Camp, slip op. at 4–6.

Precise Legal Questions Presented

The Sixth District Court of Appeal evaluated the following primary legal issues:

1. Whether an employer that captures exact work time in minutes using an electronic timekeeping system can meet its burden on summary judgment to defeat an individual employee's unpaid wage claim under Labor Code Section 510 and Wage Order No. 7-2001 by relying on a facially neutral quarter-hour rounding policy, where the employer's own records establish that the individual employee suffered a net loss of compensated time.
2. Whether federal time-rounding regulations (29 C.F.R. § 785.48(b)) and administrative guidance in the California Division of Labor Standards Enforcement (DLSE) Manual override California statutory directives requiring full payment for all work performed.
3. Whether the standing of an overpaid co-plaintiff affects the right of an underpaid plaintiff to challenge summary judgment.

Camp, slip op. at 1–3, 18–24.

Step-by-Step Argument and Judicial Reasoning

The majority opinion, authored by Acting Presiding Justice Bamattre-Manoukian and joined by Justice Danner , reversed the summary judgment against plaintiff Camp through a step-by-step statutory and jurisprudential analysis:

1. Abandonment of Appeal by Plaintiff Correa

At the outset, the appellate court dismissed plaintiff Correa's appeal as abandoned. Correa conceded that she was paid for all time worked and could not state an individual claim for unpaid wages. The court made no finding that Correa suffered an underpayment or overpayment award, treating her dismissal strictly as a procedural abandonment.

Camp, slip op. at 1–2, 24.

2. Statutory Mandate to Pay for All Hours Worked

The court reviewed California's statutory scheme, emphasizing that Labor Code Section 510, subdivision (a) and IWC Wage Order No. 7-2001 (Cal. Code Regs., tit. 8, § 11070, subds. 2(G), 3(A), 4(A)) require employers to pay nonexempt employees for "all hours worked" and "any work" performed in excess of statutory daily or weekly thresholds. The court stressed that California wage laws are liberally construed to protect workers.

Camp, slip op. at 6–8.

3. Reexamination in Light of Troester and Donohue

While acknowledging that See's Candy had endorsed neutral time rounding in 2012, the court held that See's Candy must be reexamined in light of more recent California Supreme Court decisions:

• Troester v. Starbucks Corp. (2018) 5 Cal.5th 829: The Supreme Court rejected the federal de minimis doctrine for regularly recurring off-the-clock work, emphasizing that California wage laws are concerned with "small things" and that a few uncompensated minutes per day add up over time. Troester also noted that technological advances enable employers to track small time increments precisely.
• Donohue v. AMN Services, LLC (2021) 11 Cal.5th 58: The Supreme Court prohibited time rounding in the meal-period context and explicitly noted that it "has never decided the validity of the rounding standard articulated in See's Candy." Donohue observed that evolving technology diminishes the historical administrative efficiencies associated with time rounding.

Camp, slip op. at 9–18.

4. Failure of Home Depot's Summary Judgment Burden

Applying these principles to the record, the court observed that Home Depot's Kronos system logged Camp's exact punch times to the minute. Over 1,240 shifts, Camp lost 470 net minutes (7.83 hours). Because Home Depot possessed exact digital records showing that Camp performed work for which he was not compensated, Home Depot failed to show the nonexistence of a triable issue of material fact regarding Camp's individual wage claims.

Camp, slip op. at 18–24.

5. Rejection of Aggregate System-Wide Offset Arguments

The court rejected Home Depot's defense that its rounding policy was lawful because employees as a whole gained 339,331 aggregate minutes. The court held that California law protects individual employees, and an employer cannot offset an individual worker's uncompensated time by demonstrating that other workers gained minutes overall.

Camp, slip op. at 18–22.

6. Rejection of Practical Simplicity Justifications

The court discounted Home Depot's argument that rounding simplifies payroll calculations or creates easily readable wage statements. The court held that no provision of California law privileges administrative arithmetic simplicity over the statutory requirement to compensate employees for all actual work time.

Camp, slip op. at 19–23.

7. Explicit Limits of the Majority Holding

The majority carefully circumscribed its ruling :

• The holding is strictly limited to circumstances where an employer can and does capture exact work time in minutes, and those records show an individual employee was underpaid.
• The court did not decide whether time rounding remains lawful when an employer lacks the technological capability to capture exact minutes.
• The court did not hold that all time rounding is unlawful per se, nor did it hold that employers are legally mandated to adopt exact-minute timekeeping systems.
• The decision did not issue a final wage judgment, award specific damages, or grant class certification, remanding the matter solely for denial of summary judgment as to Camp.

Majority Opinion and Concurring Opinion

Justice Wilson authored a separate concurring opinion , agreeing with the reversal but setting forth a broader legal rationale:

Justice Wilson agreed with the result but took a broader position against the neutral-rounding approach. His concurrence emphasized timely payment under §204, criticized reliance on federal regulations and the DLSE Manual, and drew on wage-averaging principles. Those propositions must be attributed to the concurrence rather than described as the majority’s narrow holding. Wilson, J., concurring, slip op. at 1–12.

Exact Appellate Disposition

The Sixth District Court of Appeal issued the following explicit dispositional orders :

1. The judgment entered by the trial court against plaintiff Delmer Camp was reversed, and the matter was remanded to the trial court.
2. The trial court was directed to vacate its order granting summary judgment against plaintiff Camp and to enter a new order denying Home Depot's motion for summary judgment as to Camp.
3. Plaintiff Adriana Correa's appeal was dismissed as abandoned.
4. Home Depot and Correa were ordered to bear their own appellate costs; Camp was awarded his appellate costs.

Camp, slip op. at 24.

Supreme Court Review and Current Legal Status

On February 1, 2023, the California Supreme Court granted Home Depot's petition for review in Camp v. Home Depot U.S.A., Inc. (Supreme Court Case No. S277518; see Supreme Court Minutes, Feb. 1, 2023, p. 116). The Supreme Court's official grant order specified the citation status of the Court of Appeal opinion under California Rules of Court, Rule 8.1115(e)(3) and Administrative Order No. 2021-04-21:

• Persuasive Citation: Pending Supreme Court review, the published opinion at 84 Cal.App.5th 638 may be cited not only for its persuasive value, but also for the limited purpose of establishing the existence of a conflict in appellate authority.
• Trial Court Discretion: Establishing this conflict permits trial courts across California to exercise discretion under Auto Equity Sales, Inc. v. Superior Court (1962) 57 Cal.2d 450 to choose between competing lines of appellate authority (such as See's Candy versus Camp) while final Supreme Court review remains pending.
• Official List Dated October 2, 2026: As reflected on the official California Supreme Court pending civil cases list dated October 2, 2026, Case No. S277518 remains pending before the high court on the core question: "Under California law, are employers permitted to use neutral time-rounding practices to calculate employees' work time for payroll purposes?"

Key Differences: Shift-Time Rounding vs. Meal-Period Rounding

To ensure precise application in wage and hour litigation, legal practitioners must distinguish general shift-time rounding under Camp from meal-period rounding under Donohue v. AMN Services, LLC:

• Meal-Period Rounding (Donohue v. AMN Services): In Donohue (11 Cal.5th 58), the Supreme Court announced an absolute prohibition against rounding time punches in the meal-period context. Because California meal break statutes enforce precise 30-minute durations and trigger statutory premium pay under Labor Code Section 226.7 for short or late breaks, meal-period rounding is categorically unlawful regardless of whether the employer tracks exact shift minutes elsewhere.
• Shift-Time Rounding (Camp v. Home Depot): In Camp (84 Cal.App.5th 638), the Sixth District addressed overall daily shift start and stop punches under Labor Code Section 510. The court held that where an employer electronically records exact shift minutes and those records demonstrate an individual net wage loss, summary judgment cannot be granted based on a quarter-hour rounding policy. Unlike Donohue's categorical ban on meal rounding, Camp specifically conditioned its holding on the employer's actual capture of unrounded exact minutes.

See the February 1, 2023 review order and October 2, 2026 pending civil issues list for the review status described here.