State Agency Office Hours

Article 2 deals with office hours. Section 11020 requires all offices of every state agency to be kept open for the transaction of business from 8 a.m. until 5 p.m. of each day from Monday to Friday, other than legal holidays. However, any state agency or division, branch, or office may be kept open for the transaction of business on other hours and on other days than those specified.

In addition, if this section is in conflict with a memorandum of understanding, the memorandum of understanding is controlling without further legislative action, except that if the memorandum of understanding requires the expenditure of funds, the memorandum is not effective unless approved by the Legislature in the annual Budget Act.

Section 11020.1 allows the Department of Motor Vehicles to reduce its hours of service for transacting business during the period between 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Monday to Friday, in order to ensure that service for transacting business may be provided within existing resources before 8 a.m. or after 5 p.m., Monday to Friday, or on Saturday. This authority may not be exercised so as to do any of three specified conditions.

Section 11021 provides that, when a state agency is open or operates on Saturday, then that state agency may operate with a skeleton crew from 9 a.m. to 12 noon of each Saturday if the total number of hours per week of its employees is not less than the total number of office hours established in this article.

Section 11022 requires each state agency to establish a procedure pursuant to which incoming telephone calls on any public line shall be answered within 10 rings during regular business hours as set forth in Section 11020, except where emergency or illness require adjustments to normal staffing levels. This requirement shall be met in every office where staff is available, unless compliance would require overtime or compensating time off.