What is the Updated Time Off to Vote Law in NY for 2019?

It’s common around election time for employees to request time from their employer to vote. On April 12, Governor Cuomo signed legislation S.B. 1505 as part of the 2020 New York State budget package, impacting employer requirements for voting accommodations.

The changes are as follows:

• A registered voter may, without loss of pay for up to three hours, take off so much working time as will enable him or her to vote at any election.
• The employee must be allowed time off for voting only at the beginning or end of his or her working shift, as the employer may designate, unless otherwise mutually agreed.
• If the employee requires working time off to vote, then the employee must notify his or her employer no less than two working days before election day that he or she requires time off to vote.
• No less than 10 working days before every election, every employer must conspicuously post in the workplace, where it can be seen as employees come or go, a notice setting forth these provisions and it must be kept posted until the close of the polls on election day.

Employers ought to post these provisions in a conspicuous place with their company labor law postings for employees to read, and call specific attention to them at least two weeks prior to an election.