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NY Attorney General requests info about ‘on-call shifts’

April 13, 2015

New York State Office of Attorney General Eric Schneiderman sent a letter Friday to 13 retailers requesting information and documents regarding “on-call shifts.” 

According to the letter, the Attorney General’s office has received reports that a growing number of employers, particularly in the retail industry, require hourly workers to work on-call shifts that require employees to call in to work just a few hours in advance, or the night before, to determine whether the worker needs to appear for work that day or the next. If the employee is told that his or her services are not needed, the employee will receive no pay for that day, despite being required to be available to appear on the job site the next day or even just a few hours later on the same day, the letter stated.

“For many workers, that is too little time to make arrangements for family needs, let alone to find an alternative source of income to compensate for the lost pay,” the letter said.

The letter also suggests such scheduling practices may violate a New York law in which employees who report for a scheduled shift on any day have to be paid for at least four hours at the basic minimum hourly wage.

The letters were sent to the following retailers: Gap, Target, Abercrombie & Fitch, J. Crew, L Brands Inc., Burlington Coat Factory, TJX Cos., Urban Outfitters Inc., Crocs Inc., Ann Inc., Sears Holdings, Williams-Sonoma Inc. and JC Penney.