New York Governor Kathy Hochul recently signed into law the Retail Worker Safety Act, which is intended to increase retail worker safety and has significant implications for New York retail employers.
The Retail Worker Safety Act (S. 8358B) applies to each retail employer in New York with at least 10 employees working at a retail store. Retail employers are defined as those “sell[ing] consumer commodities at retail and . . . not primarily engaged in the sale of food for consumption on the premises.”
The act requires, among other things, the adoption and implementation of a workplace violence prevention policy, annual workplace violence prevention training for employees, and the creation of a panic button system employees can use to trigger an alert if they believe they or a colleague is in an unsafe situation.
Workplace Violence Prevention Policy
The act requires qualifying retail employers to create and distribute a workplace violence prevention policy to all retail employees.
The policy must include the factors or situations that place retail employees at risk of workplace violence. The act states that those situations include, but are not limited to, the following:
The policy also needs to outline methods that employers may use to prevent incidents of workplace violence, “including but not limited to establishing and implementing reporting systems for incidents of workplace violence.”
Additionally, the policy needs to include information about federal and state statutory provisions concerning violence against retail workers and remedies available to employees who are victims of workplace violence.
Finally, the policy needs to clearly state that retaliation against individuals who report workplace violence, complain about situations that might place retail employees at risk of workplace violence, or who testify or assist in a legal proceeding relating to workplace violence is unlawful.
The policy must be provided in English and in the employee’s primary language upon hire and then at every annual workplace violence prevention training.
Workplace Violence Prevention Training
The act requires retail employers to provide annual workplace violence prevention training for all retail employees and requires that the training be interactive and include “measures that retail employees can use to protect themselves when faced with workplace violence.”
The act defines these measures as including, at least, the following:
As part of the training, employers must also communicate to employees a site-specific list of emergency exits and meeting places in case of emergency.
Employers must provide this training to all retail employees “upon hire and on an annual basis thereafter.”
When signing the act into law, Governor Hochul issued an approval memo that confirmed the legislature would make a few changes to the bill through a chapter amendment before it takes effect. One of those changes is to reduce the required training cadence for employers with less than 50 retail employees so that they only need to conduct the violence prevention training for new hires upon hire and then every two years thereafter.
Panic Buttons
Retail employers with more than 500 retail employees must additionally provide every retail employee with a “silent response button.” An employer can also choose to utilize wearable or mobile phone–based panic buttons; however, they must be provided to each retail employee. The act further provides that mobile phone–based panic buttons may only be installed on employer-provided equipment, and wearable panic buttons cannot not be used to track employee locations, except when the panic button is triggered.
While the initially signed version of the act specified that the panic button provision applied to employers with 500 or more employees nationwide, under the proposed chapter amendment, this requirement will only apply to employers with 500 or more retail employees in New York State. The chapter amendment also clarified that the panic button must provide employees with the ability to “request immediate assistance from a security officer, manager, or supervisor.” Finally, the chapter amendment explains that employers can comply with this requirement by installing a silent response button “in an easily accessible location in the workplace” or by providing employees “a wearable or mobile phone-based button.”
The policy and training components of the law originally were scheduled to take effect on March 3, 2025, but the forthcoming chapter amendment will reschedule the effective date to June 1, 2025 and the panic button requirement takes effect on January 1, 2027.
New York retail employers should remain informed of updates. The New York Department of Labor (NYDOL) will create a model policy and training as required by the act. Employers may either use the NYDOL templates or create their own that meets or exceeds the minimum standards provided by the NYDOL model.
The NYDOL will likely also create guidance to support employers with compliance that may include some clarifications to the law. For instance, the law does not further define what constitutes “consumer commodities,” which impacts who will be considered a covered employer under the law.
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