Yes, you can legally be scheduled to work seven days a week without a day off in Indiana. The state has no law requiring employers to give adult workers a rest day within any seven-day period, so an employer can schedule you for seven or more consecutive days as long as you are paid overtime for hours worked beyond 40 in a workweek.1Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 22-2-2-4 – Minimum Wage and Overtime Compensation
No State Day-of-Rest Law for Adults
This is where Indiana surprises a lot of workers. Some states require employers to give employees at least one day off in every seven-day stretch. Indiana does not. There is no statute capping how many days in a row an adult can work, and there is no cap on daily hours either. The only mandatory time-off rule in Indiana labor law applies to minors, not adults.
What the law does regulate is pay. The seven-day period matters as the measuring window for overtime, not as a guaranteed rest window. If you work ten days straight and your hours cross 40 inside your employer’s defined workweek, the hours above 40 must be paid at time-and-a-half. The consecutive days themselves are legal.
If you want a day off, the enforceable source is almost always something other than state law: your employment contract, a union collective bargaining agreement, or your employer’s own written policies. Indiana’s wage and hour statutes will not get you a day off, but they will make sure you are paid correctly for the extra days you work.
What You’re Owed When You Work the Seventh Day
Both federal and Indiana law require overtime at one and a half times your regular rate for every hour over 40 in a single workweek.2Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 29 U.S. Code 207 – Maximum Hours1Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 22-2-2-4 – Minimum Wage and Overtime Compensation Indiana’s minimum wage matches the federal floor at $7.25 per hour, which puts the lowest legal overtime rate at $10.88 per hour.3Indiana Department of Labor. Indiana Minimum Wage Law Your regular rate for overtime purposes also includes most non-discretionary bonuses, shift differentials, and commissions, not just base pay.
Know Your Workweek Start Day
Under the FLSA, a workweek is a fixed, recurring 168-hour block of seven consecutive 24-hour days. Your employer picks when that block starts, and it does not have to match the calendar week. It could run Wednesday to Tuesday, or noon Sunday to noon Sunday. Once set, the start point stays fixed.4eCFR. 29 CFR 778.105 – Determining the Workweek
This matters when you work a long stretch of consecutive days. If your employer has designated the workweek so that your heaviest shifts split across two different workweeks, you could end up working many days in a row without triggering as much overtime as you would expect. Ask your employer, or check your pay stubs, to find out which day the workweek begins. That one piece of information lets you check whether your overtime is being calculated right.
Unauthorized Overtime Still Has To Be Paid
Employers sometimes refuse to pay overtime they did not pre-approve. That position does not hold up. If you actually worked the hours, you are owed overtime pay for them, even if you broke a company rule by staying late or coming in on an off day. The employer’s remedy for an unauthorized hour is discipline, not withholding wages.5U.S. Department of Labor. Wages and the Fair Labor Standards Act
Salaried Doesn’t Automatically Mean No Overtime
Some workers are exempt from overtime under the FLSA’s executive, administrative, and professional exemptions, but exemption requires both a minimum salary of $684 per week ($35,568 per year) and job duties that actually match the exemption criteria.6U.S. Department of Labor. Earnings Thresholds for the Executive, Administrative, and Professional Employee Exemptions A salaried title alone does not strip you of overtime rights. If your day-to-day work mirrors that of hourly coworkers, you may still be entitled to time-and-a-half even if you’re on salary.
Minors Are the Exception
The consecutive-days rule flips entirely for workers under 18. A 16- or 17-year-old cannot be scheduled for more than six consecutive workdays in Indiana.7Indiana Department of Labor. Teen Work Hour Restrictions Poster That is the one hard day-of-rest rule in Indiana labor law, and it applies only to teens.
Older minors in that age bracket are also capped at 9 hours per day, 40 hours during school weeks, and 48 hours during non-school weeks. They generally cannot start work between midnight and 6:00 a.m., and on school nights they must stop by 10:00 p.m., or 11:00 p.m. with written parental permission. Workers aged 14 and 15 face tighter limits still: 3 hours on a school day, 18 hours in a school week, 8 hours on a non-school day, and 40 hours in a non-school week, with work generally confined to the hours between 7:00 a.m. and 7:00 p.m.7Indiana Department of Labor. Teen Work Hour Restrictions Poster
None of this applies to adult workers. If you’re 18 or older, the six-consecutive-day cap does not protect you.
If You Think You’re Being Shorted
Working seven days in a row is legal. Not paying you correctly for those days is not. Indiana Code 22-2-2-8 requires your employer to give you a pay-period statement showing hours worked, wages paid, and deductions.8Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 22-2-2-8 – Statement of Hours and Wages; Furnishing Employees; Posting Law Federal rules add that payroll records must be retained for at least three years.9U.S. Department of Labor. Fact Sheet 21 – Recordkeeping Requirements Under the Fair Labor Standards Act Keep your own copies of pay stubs and your own log of hours. If a dispute reaches a court and the employer cannot produce records, judges typically draw inferences in favor of the employee.
Filing a Wage Claim With the State
You can file a wage claim with the Indiana Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division, but the process has real limits:
- Claims must be filed within two years of when the wages were due.
- The claim amount must fall between $30 and $6,000. Larger claims have to go to court.
- Supporting documents must be submitted within two weeks of filing, or the claim will not be processed.
- You cannot file a claim with the Department if you have a pending or concluded lawsuit over the same wages.
Claims can be filed online, and documentation can be emailed, faxed, or mailed in.10Indiana Department of Labor. Online Wage Claim Form
Suing Directly
For claims above $6,000, or for more complex disputes, you can file a private lawsuit. Indiana’s Wage Payment Statute requires wages to be paid at least semimonthly or biweekly, and successful plaintiffs are entitled to attorney’s fees and court costs on top of the unpaid wages.11Indiana Department of Labor. Wage and Hour Division An employer who violates Indiana’s overtime or minimum wage rules is liable for the unpaid wages plus an equal amount in liquidated damages, which effectively doubles your recovery.12Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 22-2-2-9 – Actions and Proceedings; Damages A court that finds bad faith under the Wage Payment Statute can also order liquidated damages equal to double the wages owed.
Where Protections Might Come From Instead
Because state law will not force your employer to give you a day off, any right to one usually comes from somewhere else. Check your written employment agreement, your employee handbook, and, if you are a union member, your collective bargaining agreement. These documents can set stricter scheduling rules than the law requires, and when they do, they are enforceable through the processes they lay out.
If you are covered by a union contract and you lose a wage dispute in arbitration, that is not the end of the road for your federal rights. In Barrentine v. Arkansas-Best Freight System, Inc. (1981), the U.S. Supreme Court held that FLSA rights belong to individual workers and cannot be waived through collective bargaining, so an arbitration loss does not block you from pursuing an FLSA claim in federal court.13Justia. Barrentine v. Arkansas-Best Freight System Your overtime pay for that long stretch of consecutive days is a statutory right. It survives even when a grievance does not.