If you do payroll, bookkeeping, or HR work for California employers, you're already sitting on the exact data a break audit needs. Packaging that into a recurring service is one of the cleanest add-ons available: it reuses work you already do, reopens conversations with dormant clients, and carries genuine perceived value because the downside it prevents, wage-and-hour claims and PAGA exposure, is large.

What the service actually is

A California break audit turns a client's timecard export into three deliverables:

  • A branded exposure report, plain-English findings on missed, late, and short meal and rest periods, with an estimated unpaid-premium range.
  • A payroll correction list, the specific rows to fix, each traced back to a source record.
  • Optional monthly monitoring, a before-payroll-close check that turns the one-off into a retainer.

The value is that it's defensible: a good report separates detected issues from record gaps and states its assumptions, so it holds up when a knowledgeable reviewer reads it.

How consultants price it

A practical starting range for a scoped break-audit service is $500 to $1,500 per audit, adjusted for headcount and complexity. Repeat demand can support monthly monitoring ahead of payroll close, but the first report should prove the value before a retainer is proposed.

The delivery workflow

  1. Get the export. Ask the client for a timecard export covering the period. See the provider how-tos for Homebase, ADP, Gusto, Paychex, Square, 7shifts, Deputy, and Toast.
  2. Run the rules. Apply California meal and rest period rules to every shift. (Background: the law and how premium pay works.)
  3. Review. Confirm waiver coverage, separate detected violations from missing records, and sanity-check the exposure range.
  4. Deliver. Send the branded report and correction list, under your firm's name.
You don't need to be a law firm. A break audit is operational support based on the client's own records. State assumptions, flag record gaps honestly, and recommend counsel review before any payroll action, that's what keeps it defensible and keeps you out of giving legal advice.

What you need to start

  • The data: a timecard/payroll export, which your clients already produce.
  • The rules: the meal/rest timing and premium-pay logic, applied consistently.
  • A tool: so you're not rebuilding the audit by hand each time. BreakAuditor handles the import, rule engine, exposure math, and a white-labeled report carrying your firm's brand.