New York’s Retail Worker Safety Act will take effect on June 2, 2025. The law will require employers with 10 or more retail employees (defined as those who work in retail stores) to adopt a written workplace violence prevention policy and provide employee training. Employers with 500 or more retail employees in the state will also be required to provide silent response buttons. Retail stores don’t include those that primarily sell food to eat on-site.
Amendments as of February 2025
This law was originally scheduled to take effect on March 4, 2025, but has been amended to change some employer requirements and delay the effective date to June. The details below reflect the most recent version of the law.
Workplace Violence Prevention Policy
Employers will be required to adopt a written workplace violence prevention policy that identifies workplace risks, outlines violence prevention methods, explains legal protections, and states that retaliation is unlawful. The state will provide a model policy that employers can use.
Workplace Violence Prevention Training
Employers will be required to provide retail employees with workplace violence prevention training that’s interactive and includes information such as emergency procedures, de-escalation tactics, and instructions on how to use emergency devices such as security alarms or silent response buttons. The state will provide a model training program that employers can use. As part of this training, employers must also provide retail employees with a site-specific list of emergency exits and meeting places.
The training must be provided upon hire and annually thereafter. However, employers with 49 or fewer retail employees only need to provide the workplace violence prevention training upon hire and every two years thereafter.
Notice
Employers will be required to provide retail employees with the workplace violence prevention policy and the information presented in the training in writing upon hire and at each workplace violence training. They must be provided in English and the employee’s primary language.
Silent Response Buttons
By January 1, 2027, employers with 500 or more retail employees in the state must provide silent response buttons to employees that enable them to request immediate help from a security officer, manager, or supervisor during work. This requirement can be satisfied by installing the button in an easily accessible location in the workplace or providing employees with wearable or mobile phone-based buttons. Phone-based buttons can only be installed on employer equipment and wearable buttons can’t be used to track employees except when the button has been activated.
What’s Next?
The model policy and training are expected to be available on the New York Department of Labor’s website before the effective date of June 2, 2025.
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