In our October 2009 Client Alert entitled Recent Legislative Changes Impose New Obligations on New York Employers, we reported that, effective October 26, 2009, New York Labor Law Section 195(1) requires New York employers to provide written notices to all newly-hired employees of their (1) rate of pay; (2) regular pay day; and (3) for employees eligible to receive overtime pay (i.e., non-exempt employees), their regular hourly and overtime rates of pay. The law also requires employees to sign written acknowledgments of their receipt of such notices and employers to retain such acknowledgments for at least six years.
Since our October 2009 alert was issued, the New York State Department of Labor ("DOL") has published an official Notice and Acknowledgment form and Fact Sheets regarding the new law for employers and employees. (See the DOL's Web site.) Significantly, according to the Fact Sheets, the required notice and acknowledgment must be made on the official Notice and Acknowledgment form, before employees are permitted to perform any work. Thus, employers may no longer satisfy the notice and acknowledgment requirement by providing the required information in offer letters or other "unofficial" forms.
The Notice and Acknowledgment form currently on the DOL's website is geared toward non-exempt hourly employees. The DOL is in the process of preparing additional Notice and Acknowledgment forms for other types of employees (such as non-exempt salaried employees and exempt employees), as well as general guidelines to assist employers to comply with the new law. However, until such additional Notice and Acknowledgment forms are published, the current form should be used for all newly-hired employees. The DOL has already published forms and guidelines for temporary employment agencies.
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