Illinois Law Suddenly Requires Paid Nursing Breaks

Seyfarth Synopsis: Since 2001, Illinois has required that employers provide unpaid nursing or lactation breaks for working mothers. Effective last week, at least some of those breaks must now be paid.

On August 21, 2018, Governor Rauner signed a bill amending the Illinois Nursing Mothers in the Workplace Act. The amendment took effect immediately, and requires that Illinois employers provide paid breaks to mothers who breastfeed or express milk at work. The Act previously required that Illinois employers provide “reasonable unpaid break time” to nursing/expressing employees. It also said that breaks provided to nursing/expressing employees “must, if possible, run concurrently with any break time already provided to the employee.” As amended, nursing breaks “may” still run concurrently with other breaks. However, as to the “reasonable” number of additional breaks beyond those regularly provided to all employees, an employer “may not reduce an employee's compensation for the time used for the purpose of expressing milk or nursing a baby.” In short, nursing employees must now be paid for those extra breaks.

To understand how this works, first determine what the law (or your lawful policy) already provides as regards breaks. The federal Fair Labor Standards Act doesn't require any rest or meal breaks, but mandates that employees be paid for short breaks ranging from between 5 and 20 minutes. It also says employers can provide an unpaid meal break of at least 30 minutes, so long as the employee is not required to perform any work during that time. Separately, Illinois law mandates that employees who work 7.5 continuous hours or more receive an unpaid meal break of at least 20 minutes. Thus, in order to comply with both federal and state law, many Illinois employers provide an unpaid meal break of at least 30 minutes. Under the Illinois Nursing Mothers Law as amended, nursing employees can still be required to use that unpaid meal break for nursing or expressing milk (along with any other breaks the employer chooses to provide employees generally). Also like before, nursing mothers are entitled...