A New Maine Law Will Affect the Pay of Thousands of Hourly & Shift Workers

Personally, I have always felt that hourly jobs build character.

Restaurant work, retailer work, construction, farming work, etc.

These jobs are often some of the toughest and can be really unpredictable.  If the restaurant sees a slow day or weather does not cooperate for the work that needs to be done on the farm, your hours could be cut.  This, of course, leads to a lack of income.

A new Maine law will help alleviate some of the stress felt by employees who get sent home early.

The Maine Legislature's "An Act to Require Minimum Pay for Reporting to Work"

According to the Maine Legislature website, the act laid out in LD598 became law without the governor's signature on June 24th, 2025.

The law requires businesses to pay an hourly employee who was scheduled to work by the employee money if they were cut early.  Employees will either get two hours of pay or the remainder of the pay they would have gotten if they had finished their shift - whichever is a smaller amount of money.

It is important to note that the new law only applies to businesses of a certain size.  A business must have at least 10 regular employees.  Basically, this protects the very smallest of Maine businesses from being shackled with this new expense.

Also, if an employer can prove that they attempted to contact the employee before the report to work for that particular shift, they are not required to provide that compensation.

The law takes effect on September 24th, 2025.

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