Predictive Scheduling and Fair Workweek Laws by State: Oregon SB 828, NYC Fair Workweek, and 11 Covered Jurisdictions

The FLSA does not require advance notice of work schedules — every predictive scheduling rule in the United States is state or city law.

The compliance posture for a multi-state retail, hospitality, or food-service operator is not "what does federal law require" but "which of the eleven covered jurisdictions reach this employee, what is the advance-notice window, and what does the predictability-pay schedule say when the change happens." The Fair Labor Standards Act (29 USC §§201 et seq.) and its implementing regulations at 29 CFR Parts 516, 778, and 785 govern minimum wage, overtime, regular-rate computation, and recordkeeping. They do not govern scheduling.

Enforcement has scaled exponentially since the first ordinance took effect in 2015. New York City's Department of Consumer and Worker Protection (DCWP) settled with multiple fast-food employers for roughly $300,000 in 2020, then secured a $20 million consent order against Chipotle Mexican Grill on August 9, 2022, $2.5 million-plus from a Burger King franchisee in 2024, and a $38.9 million Starbucks settlement on December 1, 2025 — the largest worker-protection settlement in NYC history and the current record-holder nationwide for a Fair Workweek violation.

The landscape as of May 2026: one state (Oregon) and ten city-level frameworks — New York City, San Francisco, Seattle, Philadelphia, Chicago, Los Angeles City, Los Angeles County (effective July 1, 2025), Berkeley, Emeryville, and Evanston. Three preemption states (Texas, Florida, Georgia) structurally bar local adoption regardless of city-level political will.

Skip to the state-by-state table →

Quick reference

Federal floor. None. The FLSA does not regulate scheduling. Every advance-notice and predictability-pay obligation comes from a state or city statute.
States with predictive scheduling statutes. Oregon only (SB 828, 2017; ORS §§653.412–653.485, effective July 1, 2018).
Cities with Fair Workweek ordinances (10). San Francisco (2014), Emeryville (2017), New York City (2017), Seattle (2017), Philadelphia (2020), Chicago (2020), Los Angeles City (2023), Berkeley (2024), Evanston (2024), Los Angeles County (2025).
Standard mechanic. 14-day advance written schedule + predictability-pay premium for employer-initiated changes + 9-to-11-hour right-to-rest between shifts (the "clopening" rule) + good-faith estimate at hire.
Covered industries. Retail + food service + hospitality universally. Chicago is the only jurisdiction reaching healthcare and manufacturing.
Largest reported settlements. DCWP v. Starbucks, $38.9M (2025); DCWP v. Chipotle, $20M (2022); a 2024 Burger King franchisee, $2.5M+; 2020 multi-employer sweep, ~$300K aggregate.
Preempted states. Texas, Florida, and Georgia preemption statutes prohibit cities from enacting local labor standards including Fair Workweek frameworks.

The 5 most expensive predictive scheduling mistakes

Posting the schedule less than 14 days before the start of the first shift. The single most-litigated violation across every Fair Workweek jurisdiction except NYC retail (which uses 72 hours instead of 14 days). The 14-day floor applies in Oregon (ORS §653.436), San Francisco (SF Police Code Art. 33G), Seattle (SMC §14.22.040), Philadelphia (Phila. Code §9-4603), Chicago (since July 1, 2022; MCC §1-25-050), Los Angeles City (LAMC §185.04), Los Angeles County, Berkeley, Emeryville, and Evanston. The 2022 Chipotle consent order and the 2025 Starbucks settlement both surfaced advance-notice violations as the load-bearing pattern.
Missing the clopening rule by measuring from clock-out instead of from scheduled end-of-shift. Every framework lets employees decline shifts that begin within 9-to-11 hours of the previous shift's scheduled end — Philadelphia (9 hours), Oregon (10), Seattle (10), Chicago (10), LA City (10), LA County (10), Berkeley (11), Emeryville (11), Evanston (11), NYC fast food (11). San Francisco's Formula Retail ordinance predates the clopening-rule design and has no statutory rest minimum. If the employee works past scheduled end-of-shift (closing a register, finishing a customer), the rest window starts from the schedule, not from the punch — a clopening that was compliant on paper turns into a premium-pay obligation the moment closing runs long.
Treating predictability pay as discretionary. Premium schedules are statutory, not negotiable. Oregon, Seattle, Chicago, Philadelphia, LA City, LA County, Berkeley, Emeryville, and Evanston use the 1-hour-at-regular-rate model for minor changes. NYC fast food uses a fixed-dollar schedule of $10/$15/$45/$75 per change depending on (a) how close to the shift the change occurred and (b) whether the change adds, subtracts, or reschedules hours (NYC DCWP Fast Food FAQ). Worked example: a 5-store retailer averaging 3 schedule changes per week per store across 50 affected employees at a $20/hour average wage owes 1 hour × 3 changes × 50 employees × 52 weeks × 5 stores × $20 = $780,000 per year in predictability pay if it skipped the obligation entirely. A multi-quarter back-pay assessment under enforcement-agency lookback drives the aggregate.
Missing the good-faith-estimate-at-hire requirement. Oregon (ORS §653.428), Seattle, Philadelphia, Chicago, NYC, LA City, Berkeley, and Evanston require a written estimate of expected hours and shifts at hire (and annual update in some). The estimate is not a contract — actual hours can vary — but failure to provide it is a discrete per-employee violation independent of any scheduling change. Penalty schedules vary: Philadelphia imposes administrative fines under Phila. Code §9-4607; LA City imposes up to $50 per day per employee for unlawful withholding of predictability pay (LAMC §185.07); NYC DCWP can assess civil penalties per violation.
Applying HQ-state scheduling defaults to remote or multi-jurisdiction employees. A Texas-headquartered retailer with stores in NYC, LA City, and Chicago running a national scheduling system on a 7-day-advance-notice template violates all three jurisdictions' rules. Fair Workweek applies per employee work location, not per employer HQ. FLSA's silence on scheduling means there is no supremacy-clause defense — each jurisdiction's law applies independently to the employees in that jurisdiction. The 2025 Starbucks settlement covered violations across hundreds of NYC stores precisely because the national scheduling system did not surface the city-specific 14-day window.

Federal baseline: FLSA does not reach scheduling

The Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 governs minimum wage (29 USC §206), overtime (29 USC §207), regular-rate computation (29 USC §207(e); 29 CFR Part 778), and recordkeeping (29 USC §211(c); 29 CFR Part 516). It does not require advance notice of work schedules, predictability pay for last-minute changes, or rest periods between shifts.

The DOL Wage and Hour Division's Handy Reference Guide to the Fair Labor Standards Act is explicit on the omission: "The FLSA does not require payment for time not worked, such as vacations, sick leave or federal or other holidays. ... [Other] benefits are generally a matter of agreement between an employer and an employee (or the employee's representative)."

Three federal regulatory provisions nonetheless interact with state and city Fair Workweek rules and shape the practical compliance design:

29 CFR §778.208 — predictability pay flows into the regular rate

29 CFR §778.208 requires inclusion in the regular rate of "all remuneration for employment paid to, or on behalf of, the employee" except the eight categories excluded by 29 USC §207(e)(1)–(8). Predictability pay does not fall within any §7(e) excludable category — it is non-discretionary compensation owed pursuant to statute the moment the qualifying scheduling change occurs.

Worked example. A NYC fast-food employee works 50 hours in a workweek that also includes $30 in predictability pay (two $15 changes inside the 7-day window). Standard hourly compensation + predictability pay = $20 × 50 + $30 = $1,030. Regular rate = $1,030 / 50 = $20.60. Overtime premium owed on the 10 OT hours = 0.5 × $20.60 × 10 = $103 — not the $100 that would be owed without predictability-pay inclusion. The $3 weekly delta scales across an entire workforce + lookback window into the back-pay component that Fair Workweek audits routinely surface.

The retroactive case is more consequential. When a multi-week predictability-pay correction surfaces during an audit, the §778.209(b) apportionment-back-over-workweeks rule applies: each affected week's overtime regular rate gets recomputed, and additional overtime is owed for each OT hour in each affected week.

29 USC §207(j) — healthcare 8-and-80 + Chicago's covered industries

29 USC §207(j) permits hospitals and residential care facilities to use a 14-day work period instead of the standard 7-day workweek, with overtime owed at 1.5× for hours beyond 8 in a single day and beyond 80 in the 14-day period. The election must be in writing before the work is performed; see DOL Fact Sheet #54.

This interacts with Chicago's Fair Workweek Ordinance — the only jurisdiction in the cluster covering healthcare. The 14-day advance-notice window aligns naturally with the §7(j) 14-day work period: a hospital running 8-and-80 posts a 14-day schedule, and the Chicago 14-day-advance-notice rule requires the schedule to be posted at least 14 days before the first day of the work period. The two rules layer cleanly. §7(j) governs overtime computation across the 14-day period; Chapter 1-25 governs the posting and change-management for the same period.

§7(j) is OPTIONAL. Hospitals that do not elect it run on the standard 7-day workweek + 40-hour overtime threshold and are still subject to Chicago's 14-day-advance-notice rule — meaning the schedule covers two workweeks but each workweek's overtime computation is independent.

29 USC §203(m) — tip credit + restaurant compliance

29 USC §203(m) defines the tip credit that allows employers to pay tipped employees a cash wage as low as $2.13/hour federal, provided tips actually received bring total compensation to the federal minimum. Restaurants covered by Fair Workweek (NYC fast food, Chicago, Philadelphia, Seattle full-service, etc.) frequently rely on the tip credit for service employees.

Schedule changes affecting tipped employees still trigger predictability pay at the regular rate — which for a tipped employee is the cash wage (not the post-tip minimum). The NYC fast-food fixed-dollar schedule ($10/$15/$45/$75) is statutory and not regular-rate-indexed, so the tip-credit status does not change the amount owed in NYC. In jurisdictions using the 1-hour-at-regular-rate model (Seattle, Chicago, Philadelphia, LA City, LA County), the regular rate for a tipped employee is the cash wage. California cities (SF, Berkeley, Emeryville, LA City, LA County) prohibit the tip credit under California Labor Code §351 — tipped employees in California receive full minimum wage plus tips, and the predictability-pay regular rate is at the state minimum-wage floor rather than $2.13.

New York City — the most-enforced Fair Workweek framework

NYC's Fair Workweek Law (NYC Admin. Code §§20-1201 et seq.; effective November 26, 2017) is the cluster's largest enforcement target. The framework splits into two distinct regulatory regimes — fast food and retail — that share the just-cause-termination protection but use structurally different scheduling rules.

Fast food framework (NYC Admin. Code §§20-1221 et seq.). Covers chains with 30+ locations nationally; covered employees are fast-food employees in NYC. The fast-food framework includes:

14-day advance written schedule.
Predictability-pay schedule (per NYC DCWP Fast Food FAQ):

Notice before first date on the work schedule	Adds hours or changes timing without reducing hours	Reduces or cancels hours
14 days or more	No premium	No premium
Less than 14 days	$10 per change	$20 per change
Less than 7 days	$15 per change	$45 per change
Less than 24 hours	$15 per change	$75 per change

11-hour clopening rest minimum; if the employee consents to a shorter rest period, the employer pays a $100 premium per shift.
Just-cause termination protection — the employer must have a legitimate business reason plus progressive discipline before firing a fast-food employee.
Right to additional hours before hiring — existing part-time fast-food employees must be offered available shifts before the employer hires new workers.

Retail framework (NYC Admin. Code §§20-1251 et seq.). Covers retail employers with 20+ employees in NYC. The retail framework uses a 72-hour advance notice — but the mechanic is not a premium-pay schedule; it is a prohibition on schedule changes. Retail employers may not cancel, shorten, or postpone a shift, or require an employee to work outside posted hours, with less than 72 hours' notice. The structural posture is fundamentally different from the 14-day-notice + premium-pay model the other cities use.

Enforcement history — DCWP's settlement ladder

The settlement ladder demonstrates the scaling of enforcement methodology over the 2020–2025 window. Each successive multi-year investigation has surfaced larger violation patterns under longer lookback windows.

2020 multi-employer sweep — ~$300,000 aggregate. DCWP announcement — five fast-food employers settled advance-notice and predictability-pay violations, establishing the operational template for the larger settlements that followed.
DCWP v. Chipotle Mexican Grill, Inc. — $20 million consent order, August 9, 2022. Settlement order PDF. DCWP initiated the investigation in 2018 after Brooklyn fast-food worker complaints. Violations: failure to provide 14-day advance written schedules; requiring extra work without advance written consent; clopening shifts without the $100 premium; failure to offer available shifts before hiring; failure to permit paid sick leave usage. Settlement scope: ~$20M to approximately 13,000 workers ($50 per week worked at Chipotle in NYC from November 26, 2017 through April 30, 2022) plus a $1 million civil penalty. At the time, the largest Fair Workweek settlement nationwide and the largest worker-protection settlement in NYC history.
2024 franchisee settlements — $2.5M+ Burger King and $293K combined four-franchisee. DCWP announcement. A Burger King franchisee paid $2.5M+ to approximately 3,000 workers plus $230K+ in civil penalties. A separate settlement with four franchisees operating Burger King, McDonald's, and Papa John's locations: $293,928 in restitution to 152 workers plus $67,712 in civil penalties. Combined: more than 60 NYC fast-food restaurants going forward under enhanced monitoring.
DCWP v. Starbucks Corp. — $38.9 million settlement, December 1, 2025. Settlement announcement. A DCWP multi-year investigation found Starbucks committed more than 500,000 violations of the Fair Workweek Law since 2021 — denying predictable schedules, cutting hours unlawfully, blocking workers from picking up additional shifts while hiring new staff. Settlement: $35.5M in restitution to 15,000+ workers plus $3.4M in civil penalties and costs = $38.9M total. The current record-holder for Fair Workweek settlements nationwide.

Things employers consistently miss

The 11-hour clopening clock starts at scheduled end-of-shift. Not at the time the employee clocks out. A scheduled 10pm close that runs to 10:45pm because of customer flow still starts the 11-hour clock at 10pm — but the employee is in clopening territory if the next shift opens at 9am instead of 11pm.
The 30+ locations test is national, not NYC-specific. A franchisee with 30 employees in NYC operating a Burger King is covered (because Burger King has thousands of locations globally). The same franchisee operating a single independent restaurant is not.
Predictability pay is not a substitute for the advance-notice rule. Paying the $15 premium for a 7-day-out change does not satisfy the 14-day-advance-notice obligation — both the underlying advance-notice violation and the premium-pay obligation can be enforced separately.
Just-cause termination applies to fast-food only. The retail framework does not include the just-cause protection; that protection is distinctive to NYC fast food and applies only to fast-food employees.

State-by-state table

State and city coverage as of May 2026. The "Federal only" rows reflect the absence of state-level scheduling statutes; cities within those states may have their own ordinances, listed separately.

State / City	Rule	Notable	Citation
Federal (50 states + DC)	FLSA does not regulate scheduling	Recordkeeping under 29 CFR §516 applies; no advance-notice rule	29 USC §201 et seq.
Alabama	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Alaska	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Arizona	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Arkansas	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
California (state)	Federal only at the state level	Cities (SF, LA City, LA County, Berkeley, Emeryville) have ordinances	—
— San Francisco	14-day notice + premium pay (Formula Retail)	First US predictive scheduling law (effective July 3, 2015); 40+ locations worldwide + 20+ in SF; no statutory clopening rule	SF Police Code Art. 33F + 33G
— Emeryville	14-day notice + premium pay	56+ employees globally; 11-hour clopening	Emeryville Mun. Code Ch. 5-39
— Berkeley	14-day notice + premium pay	Effective January 12, 2024; 10+ employees in Berkeley + 56+ globally (formula retail); covers healthcare and warehouse alongside retail/food service	BMC Ch. 13.102
— LA City	14-day notice + premium pay	Effective April 1, 2023; retail with 300+ employees worldwide; $50/day/employee penalty for unlawful predictability-pay withholding	LAMC Ch. 9.5
— LA County	14-day notice + premium pay	Effective July 1, 2025; NAICS 44-45 retail trade (includes grocery, drug stores, general merchandise) with 300+ employees globally in unincorporated LA County	LA County DCBA Fair Workweek
Colorado	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Connecticut	Federal only	Proposed Fair Workweek frameworks have not been enacted	—
Delaware	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Florida	Preempted	Fla. Stat. §218.077 preempts local labor standards; no Florida city can adopt a Fair Workweek ordinance	—
Georgia	Preempted	HB 514 (2017); OCGA §34-4-3.1 preempts local labor standards	—
Hawaii	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Idaho	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Illinois (state)	Federal only at the state level	Chicago and Evanston have ordinances	—
— Chicago	14-day notice + premium pay	Effective July 1, 2020 (10-day window raised to 14-day on July 1, 2022); 7 covered industries including healthcare and manufacturing; 100+ employees globally / 250+ for restaurants	MCC §1-25-010 et seq.
— Evanston	14-day notice + premium pay	Effective September 1, 2023 (grace period through January 1, 2024); 100+ employees globally; broad industry list	Evanston Mun. Code Ch. 3-34
Indiana	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Iowa	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Kansas	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Kentucky	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Louisiana	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Maine	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Maryland	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Massachusetts	Federal only	Boston Fair Workweek Ordinance has been proposed multiple times in the City Council without enactment	—
Michigan	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Minnesota	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Mississippi	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Missouri	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Montana	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Nebraska	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Nevada	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
New Hampshire	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
New Jersey	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
New Mexico	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
New York (state)	Federal only at the state level	NYC has separate fast-food and retail ordinances	—
— NYC fast food	14-day notice + $10/$15/$45/$75 premium pay + 11-hour clopening with $100 premium + just-cause termination	30+ locations nationally; covered employees are fast-food employees in NYC	NYC Admin. Code §§20-1221 et seq.
— NYC retail	72-hour notice; prohibition on changes rather than premium pay	20+ retail employees in NYC	NYC Admin. Code §§20-1251 et seq.
North Carolina	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
North Dakota	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Ohio	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Oklahoma	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Oregon	14-day notice + 1-hour premium + 10-hour clopening (1.5× for consented)	Only statewide statute (SB 828, 2017); 500+ employees worldwide in retail, hotels/motels, food service; raised from 7-day notice to 14-day effective July 1, 2020	ORS §§653.412–.485
Pennsylvania (state)	Federal only at the state level	Philadelphia has an ordinance	—
— Philadelphia	14-day notice + 1-hour premium + 9-hour clopening ($40 premium)	Effective April 1, 2020; advance notice raised from 10-day to 14-day on January 1, 2021; 250+ employees AND 30+ locations worldwide	Phila. Code Ch. 9-4600
Rhode Island	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
South Carolina	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
South Dakota	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Tennessee	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Texas	Preempted	Tex. Lab. Code §62.0515 preempts local minimum-wage ordinances; the Texas Local Government Code preempts local labor standards more broadly	—
Utah	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Vermont	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Virginia	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Washington (state)	Federal only at the state level	Seattle has an ordinance	—
— Seattle	14-day notice + premium pay + 10-hour clopening (1.5× for consented) + good-faith estimate	Effective July 1, 2017; 500+ employees worldwide (retail and food service); full-service restaurants need 500+ employees AND 40+ locations worldwide	SMC Ch. 14.22
West Virginia	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Wisconsin	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
Wyoming	Federal only	No state Fair Workweek statute	—
District of Columbia	Federal only	No DC-level Fair Workweek statute	—

The shared mechanic across covered jurisdictions

Despite the patchwork, the structural elements repeat with minor variation. Compliance design lives in the deltas, not in the core mechanic.

Advance written schedule. 7 to 14 days depending on jurisdiction; the modern standard has converged on 14 days. Oregon moved from 7 to 14 days effective July 1, 2020; Philadelphia moved from 10 to 14 days effective January 1, 2021; Chicago moved from 10 to 14 days effective July 1, 2022. Every framework adopted on or after 2017 (NYC fast food, Seattle, LA City, LA County, Berkeley, Emeryville, Evanston) started at 14 days. NYC retail is the structural outlier with a 72-hour notice + prohibition model.
Predictability pay. Employer-initiated changes to the posted schedule trigger premium pay. The 1-hour-at-regular-rate model applies in Oregon, Seattle, Chicago, Philadelphia, LA City, LA County, Berkeley, Emeryville, Evanston, and SF Formula Retail. NYC fast food uses the $10/$15/$45/$75 fixed-dollar schedule. Major changes (within 24 hours, or with substantial subtraction of hours) often escalate to 4 hours of pay or shift-length-equivalent.
Right to rest (clopening rule). Employees may decline shifts beginning within 9–11 hours of the previous shift's scheduled end. The modal value is 10 hours (Oregon, Seattle, Chicago, LA City, LA County); 11 hours applies in NYC fast food, Berkeley, Emeryville, Evanston; 9 hours applies in Philadelphia; SF Formula Retail has no statutory minimum. Premium for consented clopenings is typically 1.5× regular rate, except NYC fast food ($100 per shift) and Philadelphia ($40 per shift).
Good-faith estimate at hire. Written estimate of expected hours and shifts at hire (and annual update in some jurisdictions). Required by Oregon, Seattle, Philadelphia, Chicago, NYC, LA City, Berkeley, and Evanston.
Right to additional hours. Existing part-time employees must be offered available hours before the employer hires new staff. Universal across the cluster.
Anti-retaliation provisions. Universal across the cluster; protect employees who request schedule changes, refuse clopening shifts, or invoke their rights under the framework.

Headcount-threshold comparison

The eleven frameworks use seven distinct threshold structures:

500+ worldwide: Oregon (statewide), Seattle.
300+ worldwide: LA City, LA County.
250+ employees AND 30+ locations worldwide: Philadelphia.
100+ employees globally: Chicago, Evanston.
40+ locations worldwide AND 20+ in SF: San Francisco (Formula Retail).
56+ employees globally + in-city threshold: Berkeley, Emeryville.
NYC special framework: Fast food at 30+ locations nationally; retail at 20+ in NYC.

The franchise-aggregation rule is load-bearing for fast food chains. NYC fast food aggregates at 30+ locations nationally — the chain triggers coverage, individual franchisees inherit it. SF Formula Retail aggregates at the chain level (40+ locations). Berkeley aggregates franchise networks at the chain level once a corporate-affiliation test is met. A franchisee with 30 employees in NYC operating a Burger King is covered (because Burger King has thousands of locations globally); the same franchisee outside Fair Workweek territory has no comparable obligation.

Los Angeles County 2025 — the NAICS 44-45 expansion

LA County's Fair Workweek Ordinance (effective July 1, 2025) is the cluster's largest single-jurisdiction expansion in the past 24 months. Its distinguishing structural feature: coverage is defined by NAICS codes 44–45 (Retail Trade), not by the SF "Formula Retail" or LA City "retail" framing. The combined 44–45 designation includes motor vehicle and parts dealers (441), furniture stores (442), electronics (443), building material (444), food and beverage stores including grocery (445), health and personal care stores including pharmacies (446), gasoline stations (447), clothing (448), sporting goods/books (451), general merchandise including department stores and warehouse clubs (452), miscellaneous (453), and nonstore (454).

The critical capture: grocery stores and general merchandise stores are explicitly within scope. Prior jurisdictions interpreted "retail" narrowly to mean small-format specialty retail and effectively excluded grocery from coverage. LA County's NAICS-44-45 framing closes that gap and brings the largest single class of multi-store retail operators (grocery chains, big-box stores, drugstore chains) under the framework for the first time.

The structural difference from LA City is operationally consequential. A retailer with stores in both the City of Los Angeles and unincorporated LA County must comply with both frameworks separately. The coverage overlap exists but is not identical — a grocery operator with stores in unincorporated LA County but none in the City of Los Angeles is inside LA County's framework but outside LA City's. The DCBA's Fair Workweek FAQs PDF (June 2025) is the most authoritative single document for the County framework as of the effective date.

Industry-specific rules

Fast food vs. full-service restaurants

NYC's framework is the only one in the cluster that splits fast food from full-service. The structural difference:

Fast food (NYC): counter service, limited preparation, primarily food and beverage. 30+ locations nationally triggers coverage. 14-day advance notice + $10/$15/$45/$75 fixed-dollar predictability pay + just-cause termination + 11-hour clopening with $100 premium.
Full-service restaurants (Seattle, Philadelphia, Chicago, LA City, LA County, Berkeley, Emeryville, Evanston): Higher thresholds typically — Seattle: 500+ employees and 40+ full-service locations; Philadelphia and Chicago: 250+ employees and 30+ locations. Standard 1-hour predictability pay rather than fixed-dollar.

Healthcare and manufacturing (Chicago)

Chicago is the only Fair Workweek jurisdiction reaching healthcare and manufacturing. Coverage list at MCC §1-25-020: Building Services, Healthcare, Hotels, Manufacturing, Restaurants, Retail, Warehouse Services.

Hospital nursing units: Schedule changes driven by patient acuity or staffing shortages routinely happen with less than 14 days' notice. Predictability-pay accrual scales rapidly in high-volume units. Hospitals that have elected §7(j) 8-and-80 align cleanly with the 14-day window.
Production floors with rotating crew assignments: The requirement that the schedule specify start/end of each shift creates crew-composition documentation overhead.
Warehouse services with peak-season scaling: Schedule changes driven by demand spikes (Black Friday, holiday) trigger predictability pay; warehouses that historically scaled crew on short notice face per-employee accrual.

Hospitality

Oregon, NYC (limited to fast food + retail; hotels not separately covered as a category), Philadelphia, Chicago, and Berkeley cover hotels and motels. Seattle, LA City, LA County, Emeryville, and Evanston focus on retail and food service.

Industries explicitly outside coverage

Professional services (law firms, consulting, finance) are not within any current framework's covered industries.
Construction — per-project scheduling is structurally different; no Fair Workweek framework reaches it.
Trucking and commercial motor vehicle operations are governed by federal FMCSA hours-of-service rules.
Public-sector employees (federal, state, municipal) are covered by separate collective-bargaining-driven scheduling, not Fair Workweek.
Independent contractors fall outside FLSA's employee definition and outside every Fair Workweek framework's scope.

Multi-state and remote workers

Fair Workweek applies per employee work location, not per employer headquarters. The compliance design for a multi-state operator has three workable shapes:

Per-jurisdiction policy modules in the scheduling system. Each covered location runs its own 14-day-advance-notice + predictability-pay schedule + clopening rule. Operationally heaviest; lowest labor-cost overhead.
Strictest-everywhere posture. Adopt the 14-day + 11-hour-clopening + Chicago-industry-coverage framework across the entire workforce regardless of jurisdiction. Eliminates per-jurisdiction policy complexity; pays slightly more predictability pay than strictly required outside covered jurisdictions.
Audit by work location quarterly. Apply per-jurisdiction adjustments retroactively when miscategorization surfaces. Lowest day-to-day operational burden; highest litigation risk.

Three concrete scenarios:

Scenario A — National retailer with stores in covered and uncovered states. A Walmart-scale retailer with stores in Texas (preempted), Oregon (statewide), and California (city-by-city) cannot use a single national schedule template. Oregon employees need 14-day notice; California employees in SF, LA City, LA County, Berkeley, and Emeryville need 14-day notice plus the per-city predictability-pay schedule; Texas employees have no Fair Workweek floor (state preemption); employees commuting between covered and uncovered locations track to the location where the work is actually performed.

Scenario B — Remote employee whose work crosses jurisdictions. A telemarketing employee logging in from Berkeley but supervised from Texas works under Berkeley's framework (where the work is performed). A remote-only employee in a non-covered state has no Fair Workweek obligation regardless of where the employer's headquarters or supervisor sits.

Scenario C — Franchisee whose corporate parent has multi-state coverage. A Burger King franchisee in NYC operates under the NYC fast-food framework regardless of the franchisee's headquarters because the chain meets the 30+ locations-nationally test. The same franchisee operating an independent restaurant outside NYC has no comparable obligation. This dynamic is what makes the 2024 Burger King franchisee settlement structurally significant: the franchise-network aggregation rule reached individual franchisees who would have been exempt as standalone employers.

Recordkeeping and the Mt. Clemens cascade

Every Fair Workweek jurisdiction requires the employer to maintain records of:

The posted work schedule (with date posted documented).
Every schedule change after posting (with date of change and reason).
The good-faith estimate provided at hire (and the employee's signed acknowledgment).
Employee consent to clopening shifts where applicable.
Predictability-pay payments made (with the underlying change documented).

Retention windows. Three years across the cluster: Oregon (ORS §653.412 + BOLI rules), NYC (Admin. Code §20-1207), San Francisco (Articles 33F + 33G), Seattle (SMC §14.22.090), Philadelphia (Phila. Code §9-4604), Chicago (MCC §1-25-080), LA City and LA County, Berkeley, Emeryville, and Evanston.

California's UCL 4-year extension. Beyond the 3-year Fair Workweek floor, California's Unfair Competition Law (Cal. Bus. & Prof. Code §17208) creates a 4-year lookback for any "unlawful business practice" — which includes Fair Workweek violations. The practical effect for California cities (SF, Berkeley, Emeryville, LA City, LA County) is that retention should extend to 4 years to match the UCL exposure window.

The Mt. Clemens cascade applied to Fair Workweek. When the employer's records are inadequate to determine schedule changes and predictability-pay obligations, the burden-shifting rule from Anderson v. Mt. Clemens Pottery Co., 328 U.S. 680 (1946) applies: the employee establishes the missed notice and unpaid predictability pay as "a matter of just and reasonable inference," and the employer carries the evidentiary burden of disproving the estimate. Fair Workweek enforcement investigators (NYC DCWP, Oregon BOLI, SF OLSE, Chicago OLS, Seattle OLS, Philadelphia Department of Labor) apply the same burden-shifting rule when employer records are incomplete.

Recent changes (last 18 months)

December 1, 2025 — DCWP v. Starbucks Corp. ($38.9M settlement). Mayor Adams + DCWP joint announcement. Current record-holder for Fair Workweek settlements; 500,000+ alleged violations over the 2021–2025 lookback period. The settlement methodology — multi-year lookback, per-week restitution formula, civil-penalty stack — sets the operational template for DCWP enforcement going forward.
July 1, 2025 — LA County Fair Workweek Ordinance effective. LA County DCBA. NAICS 44–45 retail trade coverage in unincorporated LA County; 300+ employees globally threshold; brings grocery stores and general merchandise stores under explicit Fair Workweek coverage for the first time in any U.S. jurisdiction.
June 2025 — LA County DCBA Fair Workweek FAQs published. FAQs PDF. Operational guidance from the issuing agency clarifying coverage tests, predictability-pay computation, and record-retention requirements for County employers.
January 12, 2024 — Berkeley Fair Workweek Ordinance effective. BMC Ch. 13.102. Extends the Bay Area Fair Workweek cluster beyond SF and Emeryville; 56+ employees globally + 10+ in Berkeley threshold; broad industry coverage including healthcare and warehouse.
January 1, 2024 — Evanston Fair Workweek Ordinance fully enforced. Evanston Mun. Code Ch. 3-34. Originally scheduled for September 1, 2023; the city granted a grace period and full enforcement began January 1, 2024. First midwestern Fair Workweek extension outside Chicago.
2024 — NYC DCWP $2.5M+ Burger King franchisee settlement + $293K combined four-franchisee settlement. DCWP announcement. Demonstrated the franchise-network aggregation rule reaching individual franchisees through chain-level coverage tests.

Pending. Boston has proposed a Fair Workweek Ordinance multiple times in the City Council without enactment as of May 2026. Connecticut and Hartford have considered frameworks at both state and city levels without enactment. The expansion pattern is concentrated in states without preemption laws (OR, NY, CA, WA, PA, IL); preemption-state geographies (TX, FL, GA) are structurally blocked from local adoption regardless of city-level political will.

FAQ

Does any federal law require advance notice of work schedules?

No. The Fair Labor Standards Act (29 USC §§201 et seq.) governs minimum wage, overtime, regular-rate computation, and recordkeeping — not scheduling. The DOL Wage and Hour Division Handy Reference Guide is explicit: scheduling is "a matter of agreement between an employer and an employee." Every predictive scheduling rule in the United States is state or city law.

Which state has a statewide predictive scheduling law?

Only Oregon. SB 828 (2017); ORS §§653.412–653.485, effective July 1, 2018. The statute applies to employers with 500+ employees worldwide that provide services in retail trade, hotels, motels, or food services. The advance-notice window was raised from 7 days to 14 days effective July 1, 2020. Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries (BOLI) enforces.

Which cities have Fair Workweek ordinances?

Ten as of May 2026: San Francisco (2014), Emeryville (2017), New York City (2017), Seattle (2017), Philadelphia (2020), Chicago (2020), Los Angeles City (2023), Berkeley (2024), Evanston (2024), and Los Angeles County (2025, effective July 1). Each has its own headcount thresholds, advance-notice window, predictability-pay schedule, and clopening rule.

What is predictability pay?

A statutory premium owed by the employer when an employer-initiated change to the posted schedule occurs within the advance-notice window. The 1-hour-at-regular-rate model applies in Oregon, Seattle, Chicago, Philadelphia, LA City, LA County, Berkeley, Emeryville, Evanston, and SF Formula Retail. NYC fast food uses a fixed-dollar schedule of $10/$15/$45/$75 per change depending on (a) timing relative to the shift and (b) type of change (addition, subtraction, rescheduling). Predictability pay flows into the regular rate for overtime computation under 29 CFR §778.208 because it is non-discretionary compensation owed pursuant to statute.

What is the clopening rule?

The right-to-rest provision in every Fair Workweek framework lets employees decline shifts that begin within 9 to 11 hours of the previous shift's scheduled end. The modal value is 10 hours (Oregon, Seattle, Chicago, LA City, LA County); 11 hours applies in NYC fast food, Berkeley, Emeryville, and Evanston; 9 hours applies in Philadelphia; San Francisco's Formula Retail ordinance has no statutory clopening minimum. If the employee consents to a shorter rest period, the employer typically owes 1.5× regular rate for the hours worked within the rest window — except NYC fast food ($100 per shift) and Philadelphia ($40 per shift).

What was the largest Fair Workweek settlement?

DCWP v. Starbucks Corp., $38.9 million (December 1, 2025). The DCWP investigation found Starbucks committed more than 500,000 violations of the Fair Workweek Law since 2021. The settlement: $35.5 million in restitution to 15,000+ workers plus $3.4 million in civil penalties and costs. Surpassed the August 9, 2022 Chipotle $20 million consent order as the record-holder for Fair Workweek enforcement.

Are tipped employees covered by Fair Workweek?

Yes. Schedule changes affecting tipped employees still trigger predictability pay. In jurisdictions using the 1-hour-at-regular-rate model, the regular rate for a tipped employee is the cash wage (not the post-tip minimum). NYC fast food's fixed-dollar schedule ($10/$15/$45/$75) is statutory and not regular-rate-indexed, so tip-credit status does not change the amount owed in NYC. California cities (SF, Berkeley, Emeryville, LA City, LA County) prohibit the tip credit under Cal. Labor Code §351 — tipped employees in California receive full minimum wage plus tips, and the predictability-pay regular rate sits at the state minimum-wage floor.

Do Fair Workweek laws preempt collective bargaining agreements?

Most frameworks include a CBA-waiver provision. Oregon (ORS §653.480), Seattle, Chicago, Philadelphia, and NYC permit waiver of specific Fair Workweek provisions through a bona fide CBA that expressly references the waiver. The waiver is not automatic — the CBA must specifically address the predictive scheduling provisions. Boilerplate CBAs that pre-date the Fair Workweek statute typically do not waive the framework.

If you discover you've been doing this wrong

Audit the lookback window before voluntary disclosure. Each jurisdiction's enforcement-agency lookback is 3 years (statutory), but California UCL adds a 4th year of exposure for unfair-business-practice claims. Pull the posted-schedule records, schedule-change records, and predictability-pay payments for the full lookback period. The audit drives the back-pay computation; voluntary disclosure without the audit risks understating the obligation.
Compute the back-pay obligation per employee per workweek. For each affected workweek: (a) confirm the advance-notice window was met for the posted schedule; (b) identify every change after posting; (c) apply the jurisdiction's predictability-pay schedule for each change; (d) recompute the regular rate under 29 CFR §778.208 to incorporate the predictability pay; (e) recompute overtime owed for each OT workweek under the corrected regular rate. The math compounds quickly — each missed predictability-pay payment shifts every overtime computation in the same week.
Reach out to the enforcement agency before they reach out to you. Oregon BOLI, NYC DCWP, SF OLSE, Seattle OLS, Philadelphia Department of Labor, Chicago OLS, LA City and LA County DCBA, Berkeley, Emeryville, and Evanston all accept voluntary disclosure as a mitigating factor. The Chipotle and Starbucks settlements were investigated-and-settled rather than voluntarily disclosed; comparable cases that surface through voluntary disclosure typically settle at a lower civil-penalty multiple.
Rebuild the scheduling system to make the next violation structurally impossible. A 14-day-rolling-window posting policy eliminates the 7-day-cadence gap that drives the most-litigated violation. Per-employee good-faith-estimate generation at hire eliminates the discrete per-employee violation. A clopening-rest check at schedule-generation time eliminates the operational trap of measuring from clock-out instead of scheduled end-of-shift. Records retention configured to the longer-of-Fair-Workweek-3-years-or-California-UCL-4-years window addresses the Mt. Clemens burden-shifting exposure.
Communicate to affected workers in compliance with the agency's restitution framework. Each enforcement agency has a preferred notice format for affected-worker outreach. NYC DCWP's settlement consent orders include the worker-notification template; following the template both satisfies the agency's communication requirements and limits subsequent worker-side litigation exposure under the same violations.

The bottom line

The Fair Workweek landscape is structurally simple: no federal floor, one state, ten cities, three preemption states blocking expansion, and a 14-day-advance-notice + premium-pay + clopening framework that the modern jurisdictions converge on. The complexity lives in (a) per-jurisdiction headcount thresholds, (b) industry-coverage variations (Chicago alone reaches healthcare and manufacturing; LA County alone reaches grocery and general merchandise via NAICS 44–45), and (c) the franchise-aggregation rule that reaches individual franchisees through chain-level coverage tests. The highest-leverage compliance posture for a multi-state operator is the strictest-everywhere model: 14-day rolling-window posting, 11-hour clopening minimum, good-faith estimate at hire, and 4-year California-UCL-aligned record retention — adopted across the entire workforce regardless of jurisdiction. The labor-cost overhead is small; the structural elimination of per-jurisdiction policy complexity is large; the back-pay-exposure ceiling drops to the strictest-jurisdiction floor.