The WARN Act, in plain English.

What the WARN Act is

The Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act was passed by Congress in 1988. It was a response to a decade of plant closings that left workers with no warning and no time to prepare. The law says employers over a certain size must provide sixty calendar days of written notice before they shut down a site or conduct a mass layoff. That is the entire law in one sentence.

WARN is enforced through private lawsuits filed by affected employees in federal district court. There is no federal agency that polices compliance. No inspector is going to show up at your former employer. If your employer violated WARN, the remedy is a class action or individual suit for back pay and benefits. That means you have to know the law exists, recognize the violation, and file within the statute of limitations.

When it applies to your employer

WARN covers employers that meet a size threshold and conduct a qualifying layoff event. Both conditions must be true. Check both before you assume you are covered.

An employment loss under WARN is any termination other than for cause or retirement, any layoff exceeding six months, or a reduction in hours of more than fifty percent during each month of any six-month period. The definition is broad on purpose.

The 60-day notice requirement

The required notice is sixty calendar days. Not business days. Sixty calendar days. In writing. To three separate parties.

• Affected employees or their representative. Every affected worker gets written notice, or their labor union if they are unionized.
• State dislocated worker unit. Every state has a designated agency that receives WARN notices and coordinates rapid response services. Your state's agency maintains a public database of filings.
• Chief elected local official. The mayor, county executive, or equivalent for the jurisdiction where the layoff occurs. Yes, the mayor has to be notified. That is the law.

The notice must include the expected date of the closing or layoff, whether the action is permanent or temporary, the expected separation date for each employee, and bumping rights if any apply. Pay in lieu of notice is allowed. An employer can pay sixty days of wages instead of giving sixty days of notice. Both satisfy the law.

Exceptions to the rule

WARN has three recognized exceptions that reduce the required notice. Courts apply them narrowly. An employer claiming an exception still has to give as much notice as is practicable.

• Faltering company. A struggling employer actively seeking capital or business that would avoid the closing. Only applies to plant closings, not mass layoffs. Hard to claim in practice.
• Unforeseeable business circumstances. A sudden, unexpected event outside the employer's control. A major client pulling out. An unanticipated regulatory action. Courts have narrowed this exception over time. It is not a catch-all.
• Natural disaster. Flood, earthquake, hurricane, or similar act of nature. Limited application. Almost never claimed outside of actual disasters.

Even when an exception applies, the employer must provide as much notice as is practicable given the circumstances and must explain in writing why shorter notice was necessary. The explanation matters. Without it, the exception fails.

Penalties for violation

If an employer violated WARN, each affected employee is owed specific things. This is where the law gets teeth.

• Back pay for every calendar day of the violation period, up to sixty days. The full daily rate, not just the hourly.
• The value of any benefits the employee would have received during the violation period. Health insurance premiums. Retirement contributions. Anything the employer was paying into.
• Reasonable attorney fees if the employee prevails in court.

Example. Your employer gave you ten days of notice instead of sixty. You are owed fifty days of back pay plus fifty days of benefit value. If you earn two thousand dollars a week and your benefits are worth four hundred dollars a week, that is about seventeen thousand one hundred forty dollars per employee in back pay alone. Multiply by the size of the layoff and you see why class action lawyers pay attention to WARN violations.

Civil penalties of up to five hundred dollars per day of violation can be assessed by the local government. But only if the employer has not already paid affected workers. Most of the time, the employee back pay is the entire remedy.

State mini-WARN laws

Several states have passed their own layoff notification laws that are stricter than the federal version. If your layoff happened in one of these states, the state law might cover you even if the federal law does not. Check yours.

• California. Cal-WARN triggers at seventy-five employees, not one hundred. Sixty-day notice required. Applies to any covered establishment with seventy-five or more employees in the past twelve months. Lower threshold, same notice period.
• New York. NY WARN requires ninety days of notice. Thirty more than federal. Triggers at fifty employees, not one hundred. Both tighter.
• Illinois. Illinois WARN triggers at seventy-five employees. Sixty-day notice required.
• New Jersey. NJ WARN requires ninety days of notice plus one week of severance per year of service on top of any voluntary severance. That severance component is unique. Read it carefully if you were laid off in New Jersey.
• Tennessee. Notification required for employers with fifty or more employees when fifty or more are affected.
• Wisconsin. State law mirrors federal in most respects but applies to employers with fifty or more employees.

How to check if you are covered

Step-by-step. Do this in order.

1. Count your employer's total full-time workforce at the time of the layoff. Does it exceed one hundred federal or the lower state threshold if applicable?
2. Count the affected employees at your specific site. Does it meet one of the three qualifying event thresholds?
3. Check the dates. If the written notice you received was less than sixty days (or ninety in NY and NJ) before your separation, that is potentially a violation.
4. Check for WARN notice filings. Most state dislocated worker units publish WARN notices on a public website. Search yours. If your employer did not file, that is a red flag on its own.
5. If you suspect a violation, consult an employment attorney within two years of the layoff. Many attorneys review WARN claims on contingency. That means no upfront cost.

Frequently Asked Questions

Sources & further reading

• U.S. Department of Labor: WARN ActFederal statute and employer guide
• DOL: State dislocated worker units directoryFind your state's rapid response office

More from the Severance Guide

• Severance Package Evaluation →
• Severance Negotiation Tactics →
• Severance vs Unemployment →
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