Also known as: Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act · WARN · WARN Act
Written by attorneys · grounded in primary & secondary sources — see below
A federal statute requiring employers with 100 or more full-time employees to provide 60 days' advance written notice of plant closings and mass layoffs to affected employees, their bargaining representatives, and designated state and local government entities.
Windham Technologies plans to lay off 250 workers at its main facility. It provides no advance notice to the employees or local officials. The affected workers sue under the statute and recover back wages and benefits for the 60-day period plus penalties for the failure to notify the municipality.
Willowbrook Capital acquires Westbrook Dynamics and immediately closes the acquired plant, terminating 180 employees. No 60-day notice is given. The former employees recover damages equal to 60 days of wages and benefits because the statute applies to the new owner as the employing enterprise.
Whitestone Bank decides to close two branches and lay off 120 employees. It sends notice only to the employees and omits the union that represents them. The union sues and obtains an order requiring payment of the statutory damages to the represented workers.
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Westbrook Dynamics faces a sudden loss of its largest customer and closes a facility without notice. It claims the faltering-company exception but cannot show it actively sought capital that notice would have jeopardized. Employees recover the full statutory remedies.
Willowbrook Capital closes a plant employing 150 workers without giving the required notice to the mayor's office. The municipality sues and obtains the statutory penalty of $500 per day for each day notice was late.
Windham Technologies employs 95 full-time workers and 40 part-time workers who together log more than 4,000 hours per week. It closes the facility without notice. The part-time workers are counted toward the 100-employee threshold, triggering liability for all affected employees.
WARN applies to private employers that employ 100 or more full-time workers or 100 or more full- and part-time employees who work an aggregate of at least 4,000 hours per week, exclusive of overtime.
The statute requires notice for a plant closing that results in employment loss for 50 or more employees at a single site and for a mass layoff that affects at least 50 employees and one-third of the workforce or 500 employees at a single site.
An employer that fails to give timely notice is liable to each affected employee for back pay and benefits for the period of the violation, up to 60 days, and may also face civil penalties of up to $500 per day for failure to notify local government officials.
The statute requires notice to the bargaining representative of affected employees in addition to the employees themselves when a union represents the workforce.
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