LS 445 (11/23) Page 1 of 2
www.labor.ny.gov
Division of Labor Standards
Direct Deposit of Wages in a Bank or Financial Institution Guidelines
The New York State Labor Law provides as follows:
Section 192. Cash Payment of Wages.
1. No employer shall without the advance written consent of any employee directly pay or deposit the
net wage or salary of such employee in a bank or other financial institution.
2. This section shall not apply to any person employed in a bona fide executive, administrative, or
professional capacity whose earnings are in excess of nine hundred dollars a week, nor to employees
working on a farm not connected with a factory.
There is no requirement that an employer obtain a permit from the Department of Labor before
instituting a direct deposit of wages system. However, for compliance with provisions of the Labor Law
governing payment of wages, an employer should observe the following guidelines relating to direct
deposit of wages in a bank or financial institution. In formulating these guidelines, the Department has
applied the principle that when an employee is paid wages by direct deposit, the
employee s
hould remain in substantially as good a position as though receiving wages in cash.
Advance Written Consent
Advance written consent of the employee should be kept on file by the employer. The consent form
should contain the name and location of the bank or financial institution and a description of the
account. The consent of the employee must be voluntary and an employer shall not institute an
arrangement of direct deposit of wages in a bank or financial institution in the face of employee
objection. The consent must be revocable at will. Employees who do not consent to a direct
deposit arrangement must receive wages in cash or by check.
Expenses to an Employee
An employee shall not be obliged to incur expense in the arrangement whereby the employee’s wages
or salary are directly deposited in a bank or financial institution or in the withdrawal of such wages or
salary from the bank or financial institution. Some examples of expenses are as follows:
a service charge, “per check” charge or administrative or processing charge
carfare in order to get to the bank or financial institution to withdraw wages
LS 445 (11/23) Page 2 of 2
Withdrawal of Directly Deposited Wages
An employee shall not be obliged to lose a substantial amount of uncompensated time in order to
withdraw wages from a bank or financial institution. Although the employer is not required to provide
employees with paid time in which to withdraw such monies, the Department has held that the employer
should provide for the loss of time when the employee requires more than 15 minutes to withdraw
wages. Such time includes travel time to and from, as well as actual time spent at the bank or financial
employee’s meal period to the extent that it decreases the meal period to less than thirty minutes. Thus,
8 or 10 minutes from a thirty minute meal period curtails it to an unacceptably short duration.
The law requires that an employee be paid wages in full on regular agreed paydays. The direct
deposit of wages in a bank or financial institution, therefore, should anticipate that an employee
should be able to withdraw such wages in full on the regular agreed payday. The arrangement of
direct deposit, therefore, may not include the withholding of any part of the employee’s wages on the
regular payday or afterwards.
Since it is not possible to anticipate all the potential wage payment problems which may be created
by a direct deposit arrangement, these “Guidelines” do not cover all situations that might arise.
Further inquiries may be addressed to the nearest office of the Division of Labor Standards, New
York State Department of Labor, listed below:
Albany District
State Office Campus
Bldg. 12 Room 185A
Albany, NY 12226
(518) 457-2730
New York City District
55 Hanson Place
11
th
Floor
Brooklyn, NY 11217
(212) 775-3880
Garden City District
400 Oak Street
Suite 102
Garden City, NY 11530
(516) 794-8195
White Plains District
120 Bloomingdale Road
White Plains, NY 10605
(914) 997-9521
Buffalo District
295 Main Street
Suite 914
Buffalo, NY 14203
(716) 847-7141
Rochester District
Room 104
Rochester, NY 14609
(585) 258-4550
Syracuse District
333 East Washington Street
Room 121
Syracuse, NY 13202
(315) 428-4057
Bronx District
11
th
Floor
Brooklyn, NY 11217
(212) 775-3719
