Arizona Labor Laws Guide

Minimum wage in Arizona in 2024

On January 1st of every calendar year, the minimum wage in Arizona rises due to the increased cost of living. Currently, Arizona's minimum wage is $14.35 per hour.

Arizona's Under 20 Minimum Wage (for employees under 20 years old) is $4.25 per hour for the first 90 days of employment.

Arizona's minimum hourly wage for full-time students is $12.20, which is 85% of the regular minimum wage.

In addition, the city of Flagstaff has a higher minimum wage than the state minimum, and it is $17.40 per hour. When it comes to the minimum wage for tipped employees in Flagstaff, it amounts to $15.90 per hour.

Tipped minimum wage in Arizona

For workers in industries that have tipping, the employer is allowed to pay their employees up to $3 less per hour than minimum wage, which amounts to $11.35 per hour. This applies only if the wage earned along with tips amounts to the same sum as if they were paid a regular minimum wage. 

Additionally, according to Arizona state law concerning equal wage rates, variations in pay for the same position based on gender are prohibited. Both male and female workers should be paid an equal amount for the same position, as long as the quality and quantity of work are the same.

Exemptions to the minimum wage in Arizona

Employees in the following sectors are not required to be paid the minimum wage in the state of Arizona:

• Domestic employees (babysitters),
• Employees working for family members or siblings,
• Employees of Arizona or the federal government, and
• Employers whose businesses earn under $500,000 per year, if their business is not covered by the FLSA.

Moreover, the Fair Labor Standards Act includes additional exceptions, some of which are: 

• Farmworkers,
• Workers with disabilities, 
• Seamen, and
• Executive, administrative, and professional employees who are paid on a salary basis. 

Arizona payment laws

According to the Arizona Office of Labor Law, employers must pay wages to their employees on set days, which is at least twice per month, and no more than 16 days apart.

Payouts should happen within 7 days from the closing of the pay period during which the wages were earned. If the payday falls on a non-working day, the payment must be made on the workday before it.

Arizona labor hours

In Arizona, a workweek is defined as any 7 consecutive days.

By law, employees working fewer than 30 hours within a workweek or fewer than 130 hours within a month are considered part-time employees.

On the other hand, full-time employees work 40 hours within a workweek. However, according to the Affordable Care Act (ACA), full-time employment can be anything over 30 hours a week.

So, it is important to check with your employer what they consider to be full-time hours before going over your pay and benefits.

🎓 Part-time vs. Full-time Employment: Understanding the Difference

Which hours worked are compensated in Arizona?

Aside from doing their regular work, employees should also be compensated for their time in specific instances.

Under Arizona labor and minimum wage laws, employers should compensate for the following:

• Waiting time — labor where employees are actively on duty, even if they are not currently doing any tasks, and
• On-call time — labor where employees wait to be called by their employer if they cannot use that time for their own purposes.

The same laws also state that employers do not need to compensate for:

• Travel time (but it could be regulated by the Fair Labor Standards Act),
• Meetings, training, or lecture time, and
• An entire workday if an employee is dismissed before their clock-out time. They are to be paid only for the hours worked.

Arizona overtime laws

The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) regulates overtime in Arizona. According to FLSA, anything over 40 weekly hours worked is considered overtime.

Unlike some states that specify overtime with daily work hours (i.e., anything over 8 hours per workday), Arizona labor laws have no such regulations.

Regarding overtime rates, hourly employees are entitled to 1.5 times their hourly wage when they enter overtime.

According to the FLSA, certain types of employees are considered exempt from overtime pay, some of which include:

• Drivers,
• Farmworkers,
• Outside salesmen,
• Executive, administrative, and professional employees that are paid on a salary basis and earn at least $884 per week,
• Highly compensated employees who earn at least $132,964 per year, and
• Computer professionals who are paid at least $27.63 per hour.

However, in Arizona, the state law claims that salaried employees are not exempt from overtime pay, but their salary requirements are higher. Since the minimum hourly wage is $14.35 per hour, and the salaried employee worked 65 hours, their weekly salary would have to be $812.05 to exempt them from overtime.

🎓 Track Arizona overtime with Clockify

Arizona break laws

How breaks are regulated across the United States will vary from state to state.

Arizona has no state or federal laws regulating work breaks, so many of the rules are determined by employers.

Arizona work breaks (meals and rest)

The number of breaks and their length is dependent wholly on the employer, meaning the rules vary from one company to another.

However, the US Department of Labor has one guideline — employers must pay for all breaks under 20 minutes, while any breaks exceeding 30 minutes are unpaid. If they need to remain at their job post (e.g. factory workers), the break must be paid.

Arizona breastfeeding laws

The state of Arizona does not regulate breaks for breastfeeding mothers in the workplace specifically.

That means the federal laws apply, so the FLSA protects mothers who are non-exempt (hourly) employees.

According to federal law, employers have to provide breastfeeding mothers with a reasonable break period and a private room that meets the following conditions:

• It is covered from view, 
• It is free from intrusion,
• It is available when required, and
• It is not utilized as a bathroom.

Mothers have the right to use this law for up to 1 year after the birth of a child.

Arizona leave requirements

The state of Arizona knows 2 types of leaves:

• Required leave, and
• Non-required leave.

When it comes to required leave, employers are obligated to provide it to their employees, while non-required leave is not mandatory. However, certain employers choose to make it a part of a collective bargaining agreement.

Here is a list of required and non-required leaves in Arizona:

Arizona child labor laws

Unlike some states in the US, Arizona no longer requires special forms for employment of youths under 18, nor written parental agreement. However, the employer needs to ask for proof of the person's age (any legal document).

When it comes to the employment of minors in Arizona, the rules are as follows:

• No child aged 13 or under is allowed to work,
• Minors aged 14 and 15 are allowed to work a very limited number of hours,
• Minors aged 16 and 17 are allowed to work, but not in hazardous jobs,
• During the school year, no minor under 16 years of age can work longer than 3 hours a day when school is in session, and 8 hours on non-school days, totaling 18 hours per week,
• Minors under 16 years of age cannot work before 6 a.m. and after 9.30 p.m. on school days. On non-school days, they can work until 11 p.m., and 
• When school is out (or if the minor is not enrolled in any school), no minor under 16 years of age can work before 6 a.m. and after 11 p.m. on school days. They can work 8 hours a day to a total of 40 hours a week.

With these being the general guidelines, let's look at specific limitations surrounding youth employment.

Prohibited employment for children under 16 and 17 years of age

Any person 16 and 17 years of age should not work in, around, or in connection with:

• Any explosive production or storage, except retail (if there is no explosives handling required),
• Motor vehicle driving, unless the minor has a valid driving or operating license, and:
• They drive no more than 2 hours per day (or 25% of work per day), and
• They drive fewer than 50 miles per day.
• Mining, logging,
• Occupations requiring them to be around or work with power-driven woodworking machines,
• Occupations with exposure to radioactive substances,
• Occupations requiring meatpacking, processing, slaughtering, or handling meat-processing machinery,
• Occupations with power-driven machines, including:
• Bakery machines,
• Paper product machines,
• Saws, and
• Metalworking, punishing, or shearing machines.
• Occupations that involve power-driven machine excavation or tunneling operations; manual excavation and trench work are allowed, as long as the surface does not exceed 2 ft of depth, 
• Manufacturing clay construction product, and
• Occupations where minors are exposed to radiation greater than 0.5 rem per year.

Prohibited employment for children 14 and 15 years of age

Any person aged 14 and 15 should not work in, around, or in connection with:

• Manufacturing,
• Processing,
• Construction,
• Occupations involving work from scaffoldings, roofs, windowsills, etc.,
• Dry cleaning,
• Warehousing,
• Certain activities in food retail:
• Maintenance or repair of machines,
• Cooking, baking, with exceptions to counters, snack bars, and soda fountains, and
• Maintenance or repair of power-driven slicers, grinders, cutters, etc.
• Certain activities in agriculture:
• Operating a tractor that has no protective gear or seatbelts,
• Operating corn and cotton pickers, combines, etc.,
• Working in bull, boar, or stud horse pens, and
• Handling dangerous agricultural chemicals.

🎓 For a more detailed insight into prohibited occupations for minors under the age of 16, you can take a look at the official Youth Labor Document.

Arizona child labor law exemptions

Child labor laws allow for exemptions in very specific cases:

• Minors employed by family members or relatives, as long as the minor is not 15 or under, and doing work in mining or manufacturing,
• Minors working as performers or entertainers (TV, radio, online, etc), as long as the agency employing them provides all the vital information on hours worked and wage,
• Minors with a high school diploma or an equivalent, and
• Minors working an apprenticeship or enrolled in a career education program approved by the Department of Education.

🎓 If you want a more comprehensive list of all child labor law exemptions in Arizona, you can view them on the Arizona State Legislature website.

Arizona hiring laws

When it comes to the hiring process, the Arizona Civil Rights Act prohibits discrimination based on race, gender, disability, and so on during the hiring process. Other regulations for the hiring process include:

• Prohibiting employers from in-depth inquiries about a candidate's health-related issue or disability. They are allowed to only inquire about the candidate's ability to perform the work in the conditions the job provides,
• Prohibiting employers from making mutual agreements with other employers that prevent candidates from getting employed at other companies (a.k.a. “blacklisting”),
• Prohibiting employers from not hiring or terminating contracts if the candidate is a registered medical marijuana cardholder,
• Prohibiting employers from making credit checks without a candidate's written permission,
• Prohibiting the employer from performing drug testing if the testing is not necessary for the job in question, and
• Prohibiting employers from hiring undocumented candidates, under the Legal Arizona Workers Act (LAWL).

It is important to remember that in cases where Arizona State law and Federal law overlap, the employer should comply with the law that benefits the employee more.

Arizona termination laws

Arizona is a state following the “employment-at-will” doctrine.

This means that employees with no written contract can be terminated for any reason at any moment.

The only caveat is that the termination cannot be considered legal if it is due to discrimination or retaliation against an employee.

Arizona workplace discrimination laws

Arizona follows strict regulations prohibiting discrimination and wrongful employment termination on multiple grounds.

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission prohibits discrimination based on:

• Biological sex,
• Race and national origin,
• Age (applies to individuals between 40 and 70 years of age),
• Pregnancy, child, or spousal support withholding,
• Sexual orientation,
• Gender and gender identity,
• Religion,
• AIDS/HIV status, and
• Disability (mental, physical), etc.

Giving bonuses, merits, or deducting wages based on these criteria is also punishable by law.

Arizona miscellaneous laws

In this final section, we will go through some of the additional labor laws that are of public interest, such as:

• Right-to-work laws,
• Whistleblower protection laws,
• Background check laws,
• Employer use of social media regulations,
• Employee monitoring law,
• Drug and alcohol testing laws,
• Sexual harassment training laws,
• COBRA laws,
• Expense reimbursement laws, and
• Record-keeping laws.

Arizona right-to-work laws

Arizona is a right-to-work state, which means that an employer cannot fire an employee if they refuse to join a labor union.

Likewise, an employer cannot use a union membership as leverage for accepting or refusing a job applicant.

Lastly, right-to-work protects employees from being fired if they wish to resign from a union.

Whistleblower protection laws

Arizona Whistleblower Law differentiates between whistleblowers in the public and the private sector. For the public sector, an employer is not allowed to fire, threaten, or discriminate against an employee if they report:

• Any unlawful practice within the company,
• Mismanagement of state funds, and
• Abuse of authority.

In the private sector, an employee is protected by the state only when reporting violations of the Arizona statute or the Arizona Constitution.

Background check laws

Arizona is among 35 US states that follow the Ban the Box legislation. According to this law, an employer cannot ask about or look into an applicant's criminal history before offering them the job.

According to Arizona background check laws, only felony convictions from the last 7 years and misdemeanor convictions from the previous 5 years can have their application rejected by the employer. Any older felony or conviction cannot be counted while considering an application.

Ban the Box is mandatory only for the public sector, and private businesses have no set guidelines. The easiest route to perform any sort of background check is through the central repository of the Arizona Department of Public Safety. 

However, only statute-authorized businesses can use this service to ask for criminal history information. This leaves most employers with basic tools, like online searches, public court records, former employers, etc.

Employee monitoring law

Arizona is a one-party consent state, which means that to record a conversation (digitally or through a phone), you need the consent of at least one person in the group you wish to record.

Video recording, such as CCTV, does not require consent from the employees. However, the cameras should only be in public locations and not in those that employees use for privacy reasons, such as:

• Bathrooms,
• Shower areas, and
• Locker rooms/Changing rooms.

Additionally, employers need to formulate a video surveillance policy they will present to their employees beforehand.

Drug and alcohol testing laws

The State of Arizona gives employers full freedom to conduct drug and alcohol testing at their discretion, as long as they have a policy detailing who can be tested, when, and why. More importantly, all employees must be informed of the policy and any subsequent changes.

A few notable conditions include:

• Allowing employers to conduct random drug testing,
• Any bodily sample can be used for testing — breath, hair, blood, urine, and saliva,
• Allowing employers to test for marijuana, although they have no grounds to fire or refuse to hire any employee who shows positive results, as recreational marijuana is legal in Arizona. However, they can discipline an employee whose work has been impaired by the influence of marijuana consumption (speech, disrupted coordination, negligence, etc.),
• Employees using medical marijuana are protected by the Arizona Medical Marijuana Act (AMMA), and
• Employers must use either the Arizona Department of Health laboratories or those certified by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Service Administration.

COBRA laws

Arizona follows the Federal Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA) but also has its own regulation called the “mini-COBRA”.

Since COBRA applies only to companies with 20 or more employees, small businesses still need their own regulation.

For this purpose, Arizona’s Mini-COBRA law provides this aid to employees working in businesses with fewer than 20 employees.

Through Mini-COBRA, former employees can continue to use health insurance through their former employer for 18 months after termination and an additional 11 months in case of a disability.

Expense reimbursement laws

Reimbursement for travel expenses in Arizona applies only to public employees and officers, public institution employees, board members, or any other state agency.

The law covers travel reimbursement by air, motor vehicles or railroads, meal, and lodging expenses, as long as the claims are submitted via appropriate forms.

Arizona record-keeping laws

As for record-keeping, Arizona law requires employers to keep certain records for up to 4 years, including:

• Payslips for all payments,
• Cash receipts and a payroll journal,
• General journal and ledger, 
• Tax report copies, 
• W-2 and W-3 copies,
• Additional accounting records required,
• Payroll records, including:
• Start and end dates of each payroll,
• Total amount paid for each service, and
• Dates when the largest number of employees worked.
• Information about each employee, including:
• Employee's full name,
• Their social security number,
• Date hired, rehired, or returned to work,
• Date employment ended and the reason(s) for separation from work,
• Payment of wages paid in each calendar quarter,
• Payment of wages paid each pay period, including the value of any payment in a form other than cash,
• Amount and date of any special payment, such as a bonus, gift, or prize, and
• Place in which services were performed.

These rules apply to all employers in Arizona, whether or not they have to pay the unemployment tax.

Frequently asked questions about labor laws in Arizona

To ensure this guide is as comprehensive as possible, we have added an FAQ section where we will answer the most common questions about labor laws in Arizona.

What are the labor laws in Arizona?

Arizona uses both federal and state laws to regulate employment. Here are some of the most influential employment and labor laws in Arizona to know:

• Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA),
• Civil Rights Act, Title VII,
• Arizona Whistleblower Laws,
• Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA),
• Arizona Employment Protection Act (AEPA),
• Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA),
• Arizona Civil Rights Act, and
• Arizona Child Labor Laws.

Is it legal to work 8 hours without a break in Arizona?

Yes, it is legal. No federal or state laws require employers to provide breaks to employees. However, if employers give employees short breaks of up to 20 minutes, they are considered compensable.

What is the 23-1501 law in Arizona?

A.R.S. 23-1501, also known as the Arizona Employment Protection Act (AEPA), protects employees from wrongful termination. Employers are held liable for wrongful termination under AEPA if one of the following happens:

• Termination violates the employment contract,
• Termination violates a specific state law, and
• Termination is an act of retaliation against the employee.

Employees should use all administrative procedures before filing a complaint under this law.

Is there pay transparency in Arizona?

No, there is no Arizona pay transparency law that requires employers to reveal payment information.

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Conclusion/Disclaimer

We hope this Arizona labor law guide has been helpful. Once again, we remind you to pay attention to the links we have provided, as most of them will lead you to the official websites and other relevant information.

Please note the article was written in July 2024, so any changes in the rule of law that happen later than that may not be included in this Arizona labor law guide.

We strongly advise you to consult with the appropriate institutions or certified representatives before acting on any legal matters.

Clockify is not responsible for any losses or risks incurred should this guide be used without further guidance from legal or tax advisors.