Colorado has daily overtime — and it starts at hour 12.
Out-of-state employers expanding into Colorado miss this rule constantly. Under COMPS Order #40, non-exempt workers earn 1.5× pay for hours over 12 in a workday, over 12 consecutive hours, or over 40 in a workweek — whichever produces the higher pay. Hours can't be averaged across weeks. Comp time is illegal in the private sector.
Daily Overtime — 12-Hour Trigger
Tracks single-workday hours toward Colorado's 12-hour daily overtime threshold. Calculates 1.5× pay automatically and surfaces the controlling computation when daily, weekly, and consecutive triggers all apply.
What those three rules do when a 13-hour shift actually shows up.
The hero card on this page shows the configuration: Avoid at 11 hours, Critical past 12, Flag on the timesheet. Here's what each one does at runtime.
While building the schedule, the manager sees a yellow indicator on the shift block: "Trends past 11hr — daily OT after 12." The schedule still saves. The warning is logged.
On save, a confirmation prompt names the OT exposure: "This shift will be 13 hours. You'll owe 1 hour at 1.5× under COMPS Order #40." The save proceeds only after explicit acknowledgment.
Hour 12.01 onward auto-tags as Daily OT, regardless of who initiated the schedule change. Payroll close never sees an untagged hour that should have been overtime.
We'll deploy daily OT in your Teambridge.
Tell us about your workforce. We'll spin up Daily Overtime — alongside the other 17 Colorado policies — in a sandbox tenant scoped to your roles, locations, and pay structure. You see your actual workforce running compliantly before you commit.
Three triggers. The highest one wins.
Colorado overtime fires on three independent thresholds. For any given workweek, the calculation that produces the most overtime pay controls — you cannot pick the one that benefits the employer.
Trigger 1: Over 40 hours in a workweek
The federal FLSA rule. Calculated Sunday-through-Saturday by default, though employers may designate any 7-day period as their workweek (it must remain fixed). Hours from two or more weeks cannot be averaged.
Trigger 2: Over 12 hours in a single workday
The Colorado-specific daily trigger. A "workday" is any consecutive 24-hour period starting at the same time each calendar day. If you pay daily OT after 12 hours and a worker logs 13 hours on Tuesday, you owe 1× for hours 1–12 and 1.5× for hour 12.01–13. This is independent of weekly totals.
Trigger 3: Over 12 consecutive hours
The shift-spanning trigger. A 13-hour shift that crosses from 8pm Monday to 9am Tuesday triggers OT for hour 13, regardless of when the workday "starts" for purposes of trigger 2. This catches overnight shifts that wouldn't otherwise hit either threshold.
How the calculation interacts
For each workweek you compute all three triggers and pay whichever produces the greatest OT premium. You do not stack them — a single hour cannot be paid at 2.5× because it triggered both daily and weekly OT. But you may not under-pay by selectively applying only one trigger.
| Schedule | Daily OT analysis |
|---|---|
| Mon 14 hrs · Tue 0 · Wed 8 · Thu 8 · Fri 0 | Weekly total = 30 hrs (no weekly OT). But Mon triggers daily OT: 12 reg + 2 OT. Pay = 28 reg + 2 OT (regardless of low weekly total). |
| Mon 13 · Tue 13 · Wed 13 · Thu 13 · Fri 0 | Weekly total = 52 hrs. Daily OT = 4 hrs (1 hr × 4 days over 12). Weekly OT after 40 = 12 hrs. Weekly trigger controls: 40 reg + 12 OT. |
| Mon 8pm to Tue 9am (13 hrs straight) | 12 consecutive hour trigger fires. 12 reg + 1 OT, even if Mon and Tue calendar days each show only partial hours. |
Teambridge calculates the controlling trigger automatically.
You don't pick which trigger applies. You don't compare weekly to daily and pick the higher one. Teambridge runs all three calculations on every shift, every payroll close, and pays whichever controls. Here's what that looks like at three moments.
The 13th hour shows resistance.
When a manager drags a shift past 11 hours, Teambridge surfaces an Avoid warning: this trends into daily OT. At 12+ hours, the warning escalates to Critical — the schedule still saves, but it requires explicit acknowledgment that you understand you'll owe OT.
Hours past 12 auto-tag as daily OT.
Whether scheduled or unscheduled, when a worker clocks past 12 hours in a workday, Teambridge tags those minutes with a Flag indicator. Payroll never sees an untagged hour that should have been OT.
The controlling computation wins.
For each workweek, Teambridge computes daily, weekly, and consecutive triggers in parallel. The calculation producing the highest OT premium is the one applied. You see the comparison in the close report — auditable, defensible, ready for CDLE.
Visible to the worker, too.
When a worker views their paystub, the breakdown shows regular hours, daily OT hours, weekly OT hours, and the controlling logic. The HFWA rule requires this transparency for sick leave; Teambridge applies the same standard to overtime.
Still evaluating? Get a free Colorado compliance audit.
Send us your existing CO scheduling and pay configuration. Our compliance team returns a written audit within 5 business days — every CO-specific exposure ranked by risk and back-pay liability.