Human Resource Blog

pay period

is the following memo leagle?
Starting April 2010 the company will be going to a bi weekly pay period. (When you receive a payroll check it will be for two weeks pay and the next week there will be no check.)
Pay schedule:
One week paycheck 2010
March 5th
March 12th
March 19th
Two week paycheck 2010
April 2nd      Aug 20th
April 16th     Sept 3rd
April 30th     Sept 17th
May 14th      Oct 1st
May 28th     Oct 15th
June 11th    Oct 29th
June 25th    Nov 12th
July 9th      Nov 26th
July 23rd    Dec 10th
Aug 6th     Dec 24th

Yes. This is a fairly routine way for your company to go from paying employees every week to paying employees every two weeks.

 You as an employer can establish the paydays for the company. Various state and federal laws require that the employer actually pays the workers on the payday the employer has established. However, there is nothing to keep the employer from changing the pay cycle. Many states require that the employees be informed of the change in pay cycle in advance — sometimes up to a month in advance. You are informing employees months in advance, which is more than fair.

If you switched the payday around unpredictably or frequently, that would be illegal. But in this case, beginning April 1, you will be paying employees every other week. Millions of employers do the same.