New York Employment Law Roundup: What Employers Need to Know About Recent Developments

New York State and New York City continue to expand the reach of laws and regulations governing the employment relationship.  Over the past year, the State passed a first-of-its-kind personnel records access law, while the City finalized detailed rules implementing the amended Earned Safe and Sick Time Act and enacted a series of local laws establishing new rights for delivery and for-hire vehicle workers.  Meanwhile, the New York State Legislature has passed several consequential employment bills that await action from Governor Kathy Hochul. Each of these developments is described in more detail below.

New York Enacts a Statewide Personnel Records Access Law

On September 9, 2026, Governor Hochul signed S3460 (A.2107), adding new § 210-b to the New York Labor Law to grant current and former New York employees the right to access, review, and challenge information in their personnel records.  The law takes effect November 8, 2026, and applies to all employers regardless of size.

Under the new law, a “personnel record” is a record that identifies an employee and that the employer uses, has used, or may use to determine the employee’s qualifications for employment, promotion, transfer, additional compensation, or disciplinary action.  The definition also covers records that third parties, such as payroll providers or professional employer organizations, keep for the employer under contract.

Employers must retain an employee’s complete personnel record from the date of employment until three years after the last date of employment.  Furthermore, upon written request, an employer must provide an employee or former employee with a copy of their personnel record, which must include, without limitation, the following documents and information to the extent maintained by the employer:

• the employee’s name, address, date of birth, job title and description;
• rate(s) of pay and any other compensation;
• starting date;
• job application;
• resumes or other forms of employment inquiry submitted to the employer in response to the employer’s advertisement;
• performance evaluations;
• written warnings and records of probationary periods;
• waivers signed by the employee;
• copies of dated termination notices; and
• any other documents relating to disciplinary action regarding the employee.

The statute requires employers to provide the personnel record, at no cost, within five business days of the employee’s or former employee’s written request and to permit review at least twice per calendar year.

Additionally, employers must notify an employee within 10 days (presumably calendar days, but the statute does not specify) of placing in the personnel record any information that may “negatively affect” the employee’s qualifications for employment, promotion, transfer, additional compensation, or the possibility of disciplinary action.  An employee’s request to review their personnel record in response to such a notice from the employer does not count toward the employee’s annual limit of two reviews of their personnel record.  Should an employee disagree with the negative information placed in their record, the employer and employee may mutually agree to remove or modify any such information.  If the disagreement persists, an employee may address disputed information through a written statement that becomes part of the personnel record.  Note that the law does not specify what “negatively affect” means, nor does it specify the form of notice employers must provide.

The law prohibits retaliation against an employee for exercising rights under the statute, and specifically prohibits employers from threatening to contact or contacting immigration authorities or reporting or threatening to report suspected citizenship or immigration status of the employee or their family or household member.  The law authorizes the Attorney General to seek fines of $500 to $2,500 per violation of the law.

In her approval memorandum, the Governor conditioned her signature on a 2027 chapter amendment clarifying that employers need not create personnel records or new documents beyond the records they already keep.  Until then, the law as signed governs, and employers should confirm that their recordkeeping and retention policies comply with the law before it takes effect on November 8, 2026.

New York City Finalizes Rule Implementing the Amended Earned Safe and Sick Time Act

Local Law 145, which took effect February 22, 2026, amended New York City’s Earned Safe and Sick Time Act (“ESSTA”) in several key ways.  It expanded the permitted uses of leave to include caring for a child or care recipient, attending legal proceedings related to subsistence benefits or housing, and responding to a public disaster or workplace violence.  The law now requires employers to provide at least 32 hours of unpaid safe and sick time, available on the first day of employment and the first day of each calendar year, in addition to the 40 or 56 hours of paid leave already required (depending on employer size).  The amendment also codified the 20 hours of paid prenatal leave already required by state law into the City’s Administrative Code, bringing the entitlement within the Department of Consumer and Worker Protection’s (“DCWP”) existing enforcement authority and subjecting it to the ESSTA’s remedies and civil penalties.

More recently, DCWP adopted a final implementing rule, effective July 23, 2026, that defines “protected time off” to cover both paid and unpaid safe and sick time and clarifies how employees accrue and use that time under the ESSTA.  Key provisions of the rule include:

• part-time employees and mid-year hires must receive the full 32 hours of unpaid leave, not a pro rata share;
• employers may satisfy the unpaid-leave requirement by providing additional paid leave, provided at least 32 hours are available from the first day of employment and first day of each calendar year;
• employers may require employees to use protected time off in minimum increments of up to four hours per day, but only if such increments are reasonable under the circumstances;
• when an employee separates from employment, employers that use electronic pay systems must either keep the employee’s system access open for six months or, within one week after the last payday, provide a written statement of the employee’s protected time off accrual, use, and balance information for the final pay period; and
• employers must reinstate unused unpaid time for employees rehired within the same calendar year and must draw from paid time first unless the employee requests otherwise.

Employers with personnel in New York City should be sure to review and update their leave policies for compliance with these updates.

New York City Delivery and For-Hire Vehicle Laws: New Obligations, New Litigation, and a Pending Bill

Five local laws took effect January 26, 2026, significantly expanding the City’s regulatory framework for app-based delivery work:

• Local Law 124 extends the City’s food delivery worker minimum pay requirements to grocery delivery workers and authorizes DCWP to tailor those requirements to grocery delivery work by rule;
• Local Law 107 and Local Law 108 require third-party food and grocery delivery services to offer customers a conspicuous opportunity to tip before or when they place an order, with options that include at least 10 percent of the purchase price and a custom amount or percentage;
• Local Law 113 requires delivery services to pay all compensation, including gratuities, within seven calendar days after each pay period ends, and to provide an itemized pay statement showing how the worker’s minimum pay was calculated; and
• Local Law 123 extends the City’s delivery worker protections beyond food delivery to “contracted delivery workers” generally, requires delivery services to disclose key trip details (including pick-up locations, estimated time and distance, and pay) before a worker accepts a trip, and requires businesses to give workers picking up orders access to their restrooms, subject to limited exceptions.

While several legal challenges have been filed against the five new delivery laws, courts have thus far declined to block them, and the laws remain in effect while two challenges proceed on appeal.

A separate law governing for-hire vehicle drivers has fared differently.  Local Law 52 would have barred high-volume for-hire vehicle services from deactivating drivers after a 30-day probation period except for just cause or other limited reasons.  It also would have required those services to reinstate certain drivers they deactivated in the seven years before the law’s effective date.  In July 2026, a federal court preliminarily enjoined the law before it took effect; the City has appealed.

Looking ahead, Int. No. 518 (the “Delivery Protection Act”) would require “last-mile facilities” to obtain a DCWP license and directly employ their warehouse workers and delivery drivers, rather than using staffing agencies or subcontractors.  Operators that still use contracted delivery workers would have to post a $500,000 bond per worker.  Mayor Zohran Mamdani announced his support for the bill on August 10, 2026, and as of this writing, it awaits a City Council vote.  Employers operating last-mile facilities in the City should monitor this legislation closely.

Employment Bills Awaiting Governor Hochul’s Signature

Several significant employment bills have passed both chambers of the state legislature and await Governor Hochul’s review:

• S8877 (the “Ghost Jobs” Bill) would require employers with 100 or more employees, and third-party job posting entities, to state on job posts in bold capital letters whether the posting is for a current vacancy or only to collect resumes, and to remove postings within two weeks after the position is filled.  Fines would start at $2,500 per publication or platform, rise to $5,000 if the violation isn’t fixed within 30 days, and then double every 30 days.
• S372A (the “No Severance Ultimatums Act”) would require employers offering severance agreements that release claims to provide a 21-day consideration period, a seven-day revocation period, and notice of the right to consult an attorney.  Employees could still voluntarily sign a severance agreement prior to the end of the 21-day consideration period.  Any noncompliant agreement would be void in its entirety.
• S4424A (the “Anti-Waiver of Employment Rights Act”) would void contractual provisions that waive or limit employees’ substantive or procedural rights under the New York Labor Law and the New York State Human Rights Law, with exceptions for certain settlements and separation agreements.  A federal-preemption carveout would likely preserve arbitration agreements governed by the Federal Arbitration Act, but contractual limitations periods and jury waivers may no longer be enforceable.
• S8706-B would require businesses with more than 50 employees, and all publicly traded entities, to report annually, on or before March 1, to the state Department of Labor on how artificial intelligence affects their workforce, including estimates of jobs displaced, added, or left unfilled because of AI, and on the nature of their AI use, including its objectives, human oversight, use with sensitive personal data, and risk-reduction measures.  Penalties would reach $500 per day, with a 90-day cure period.  The first reporting deadline would be March 1, 2027.  (For a discussion of recent automated decision-making technology legislation in other jurisdictions, including California’s new laws requiring notice of AI-driven layoffs and restricting automated decision systems, see our prior blog posts here and here.)

Each of these bills would take effect immediately if enacted.  Employers with New York operations may wish to begin assessing what changes to their severance templates, job posting practices, employment agreements, and AI governance and recordkeeping may be required.

If you have questions about these new laws or bills, please contact members of Covington’s employment practice group.