Resignation: What of My Unpaid Wages/Salary Can I Recover After I Quit

My question involves labor and employment law for the state of CALIFORNIA:

Hi, I would appreciate feedback from law students and/or professional practitioners on the matters of trying to recover unpaid compensation for work completed.

Here are just the facts:

• I have been employed full-time by this Employer for over 3 years.
• Many of our Clients (primarily in the Energy industry) require us to travel to their work site to complete our projects/contracts with them. The Client is charged a day rate for our hire, and a small portion of that is paid to the Employee that travels to complete the project. The Employer does not pay to the Employee days that we are on stand-by. So for example, I have traveled to Alabama to action a project, however I have been put on stand-by at a hotel there because I was unable to get to the work site due to weather, transport issues, no 'green-light' from Client, etc. Employer will not pay the Employee for days spent at a hotel though the Client is billed and pays for those days.
• Employer does not include pay for on-site work at next coming paydate. Employer instead waits until the Client pays first, then pays the Employee. Recent year, Employer has been incredibly late to include these payments in the paycheck. Some contracts have been paid by the Client for well over a year and the Employer still has not paid the Employee for the work.
• Employer provides 1 vacation day per Saturday worked, and 1.5 vacation days per Sunday worked. I have currently accrued over 60 vacation days. Employer wants to cash my vacation days at 30% my salary and leave me with 30 vacation days.

I have signed and accepted the late pays without any trouble. I have previously had my employer convert my vacation days to cash, though I believe it was also at 30%, possibly less--I have agreed to and signed the converted pay because I was ignorant at the time of their worth as provided by California law.


I have recently decided to resign from my Employer, but not without requesting a salary increase first because I have very recently discovered that my vacation days are actually worth 100% of the day rate of my salary. So I thought I'd up the value of my remaining vacation days and cash-out. The Employer also does not know the value of a vacation day in California.

At the time of my resignation, I intend to ask my Employer to

• ...convert my remaining vacation days at 100% of my current salary.
• ...pay me everything on my last day at the office. The date I stated on the Letter of Resignation.

The Employer has in the recent 12 months, been incredibly late to make payroll to Employees. I intended to tell my Employer that each day that I do not receive my last pay beyond the last work date, then I will seek a "waiting time penalty". Is this allowed of me?

I also intend to tell my Employer, that should I be forced into court to fight to recover my wages, then I will seek to recover the pay that was not paid for past stand-by days at/near the work site. I will seek to recover "waiting time penalties" for the multiple times the Employer has been late to make payroll, and also the untimely pays for work site projects completed. And I will seek to recover the full balance of my previously converted vacation days. Do I have any right to do this considering I've already signed for and accepted what was paid (ignorantly)?

I really don't want to have to go to court over this.

Resignation: What of My Unpaid Wages/Salary Can I Recover After I Quit