The proposed New York call-in pay regulations are halted, according to a statement from the New York Department of Labor (DOL).

The proposed regulations appeared in the December 12, 2018 issue of the State Register and were subject to a 30-day comment period. The updated version of proposed regulations would have required employers to pay employees who are called in or whose schedules are not set in advance. This was referred to as call-in pay, on-call scheduling, or just-in-time pay.

“Based on extensive feedback in the subsequent comment period, it was clear the Department’s initial intent to support workers while being fair to businesses was viewed as a one-size-fits-all approach that was not appropriate for every industry,” the DOL statement read. “Comments on the revised rules, issued in late 2018, indicated that significant issues remained, and the revisions did not achieve the balance of certainty and flexibility for either workers or businesses.”

The DOL statement continued, “At this time, due to the constraints of the regulatory process, the best course of action is to let this process expire and re-evaluate in the future, likely in concert with the Legislature, which would have a broader authority and better legal standing than Department of Labor regulations alone to balance the various needs of workers, businesses and industries.”

The reference in the DOL’s statement to the legislature signals that call-in pay requirements for New York employers may still be implemented in the future.

Employers are reminded that the proposed call-in pay regulations were an expansion of existing call-in pay requirements. Employers that are subject to the miscellaneous industries and occupations minimum wage order are still required to pay an employee who, by request or permission of the employer, reports to work for at least four hours, or the number of hours in the employee’s regularly scheduled shift, whichever is less, at the basic minimum hourly wage. See 12 NYCRR § 142-2.3.

For more information, contact:

• Christopher P. Maugans
• Caroline J. Berdzik
• Kristin Klein Wheaton
• Peter J. Woo
• Or another member of our Employment and Labor Practice Group