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69ZEA: Exemption from requirement to provide rest breaks and meal breaks
or “ Some workers in important jobs might not get regular breaks if it's too hard to replace them ”
You could also call this:

“When workers don't get their usual breaks, they should get other fair rewards like time off or extra pay”

If you and your employer can’t agree on rest breaks or meal breaks, your employer must give you compensatory measures. These are things to make up for not getting your breaks as normal.

Compensatory measures can be different things. They might give you time off work at another time during your work day. For example, you could start later, finish earlier, or save up time to take off later. They might also give you extra money. Or they could give you both time off and extra money.

If you get time off as a compensatory measure, it must be at least as long as the break you missed. It should also be given to you in the same way as your normal break would have been.

If you get extra money as a compensatory measure, it must be for at least the amount of time you worked instead of taking your break. If your pay changes during your work time, they’ll use your average pay rate to work out how much to give you. If your pay doesn’t change, they’ll use your normal pay rate.

If you get both time off and extra money, the total must be at least equal to the break you missed. The extra money part will be worked out using your average pay rate if your pay changes, or your normal pay rate if it doesn’t.

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Next up: 69ZF: Penalty

or “The boss might get in trouble if they don't give you proper break times.”
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Part 6D Rest breaks and meal breaks

69ZEBCompensatory measures

  1. If the employer and employee are unable to reach agreement under section 69ZEA(4), an employee is entitled to, and the employee’s employer must provide the employee with, compensatory measures.

  2. In this section, compensatory measure—

  3. means a measure that is reasonable and designed to compensate an employee for a failure to provide rest breaks or meal breaks in accordance with section 69ZD(1); and
    1. may include (without limitation)—
      1. a measure that provides the employee with time off work at an alternative time during the employee’s work period (for example, by allowing a later start time, an earlier finish time, or an accumulation of time off work that may be taken on 1 or more occasions); or
        1. financial compensation; or
          1. both time off work at an alternative time and financial compensation.

          2. For the purposes of subsection (2),—

          3. if the compensatory measure provided is time off work at an alternative time,—
            1. the employee must be provided with at least an equivalent amount of time off work (that is, the same amount of time that the employee would otherwise have taken as a rest break or meal break); and
              1. the time off work at an alternative time must be provided on the same basis as the rest break or meal break that the employee would otherwise have taken:
              2. if the compensatory measure provided is financial compensation, that financial compensation, at a minimum, must relate to the amount of time that the employee was required to work but would otherwise have taken as a rest break or meal break, and must,—
                1. in the case of an employee paid at variable rates during a work period, be calculated at the employee’s average rate of pay in the relevant work period; or
                  1. in the case of any other employee, be calculated at the employee’s ordinary rate of pay:
                  2. if the compensatory measure includes both time off work at an alternative time and financial compensation, the total amount of alternative time plus time for which payment is made must be at least equivalent to the amount of time that the employee would otherwise have taken as a rest break or meal break.

                    1. For the purposes of subsection (3)(c), any financial compensation must,—

                    2. in the case of an employee paid at variable rates during a work period, be calculated at the employee’s average rate of pay in the relevant work period; or
                      1. in the case of any other employee, be calculated at the employee’s ordinary rate of pay.

                        Notes
                        • Section 69ZEB: replaced, on , by section 43 of the Employment Relations Amendment Act 2018 (2018 No 53).