New York Separation and Release Agreement
New York closely regulates what a separation agreement can do with discrimination claims. Confidentiality about the underlying facts must be the employee's preference, with up to 21 days to consider and seven days to revoke. A release can fail outright if the agreement penalizes the employee for speaking, and separate statutory notices are due at termination whatever the agreement says.
What New York law does to this document
Confidentiality must be the employee's preference
An employer may not include a term preventing disclosure of the underlying facts and circumstances of a discrimination claim unless confidentiality is the complainant's preference. The complainant has up to 21 days to consider the term. If the complainant agrees, the preference is recorded in an agreement signed by all parties, and the complainant then has at least seven days to revoke.
N.Y. Gen. Oblig. Law § 5-336(1)Terms that void the release
For agreements entered into on or after November 17, 2023, a release of a discrimination, harassment or retaliation claim is unenforceable in three situations. They are where the agreement requires the complainant to pay liquidated damages for breaching a nondisclosure or nondisparagement clause, to forfeit all or part of the consideration for such a breach, or to state that the complainant was not in fact subjected to unlawful discrimination.
N.Y. Gen. Oblig. Law § 5-336(3)Notices due at termination
The employer must tell a terminated employee in writing the exact date of termination and the exact date employee benefits end, no more than five working days after the termination date. At each separation the employer must also give written notice of the right to file for unemployment benefits, on a form the Department of Labor furnishes or approves. A separation agreement does not replace either notice.
N.Y. Labor Law §§ 195(6), 590(2)Final wages and accrued vacation
Final wages are due no later than the regular pay day for the pay period in which the termination occurred. Whether unused vacation must be paid depends on the employer's written policy. The Department of Labor's position is that an employer without a written forfeiture policy must pay accrued vacation.
N.Y. Labor Law §§ 191(3), 198-cBenefits a release cannot waive
An agreement by an employee to waive rights under the unemployment insurance law is not valid. A waiver of workers' compensation is likewise invalid except as the statute allows, and a settlement of a compensation claim does not bind the parties unless the Workers' Compensation Board approves it. A general release should carve both out.
N.Y. Labor Law § 595(1); N.Y. Workers' Comp. Law § 32Group layoffs and the state WARN Act
New York's WARN Act covers employers with 50 or more employees, not counting part-time employees, and requires at least 90 days' notice. A mass layoff is covered when, within 30 days at one site, it affects at least 25 employees who make up at least 33 percent of the workforce there, or at least 250 employees, in each case not counting part-time employees. A plant closing is covered when 25 or more such employees lose their jobs.
N.Y. Labor Law §§ 860-a, 860-bWhere people go wrong in New York
- Adding a liquidated damages or clawback remedy to the non-disparagement or confidentiality clause, which makes a release of discrimination claims unenforceable under General Obligations Law § 5-336(3).
- Signing the generator's draft unchanged where discrimination claims are released: it conditions the severance on the employee's compliance with continuing obligations, has the employee state that the employee is not aware of any unlawful conduct by the employer, and has no separate signed statement of the employee's confidentiality preference, so those terms need to be revised against General Obligations Law § 5-336(1) and (3).
- Folding the termination notice into the agreement and missing the five-working-day deadline in Labor Law § 195(6) or the unemployment notice in Labor Law § 590(2).
How the generator works
A severance-for-release agreement that trades a defined severance payment for a general release of claims, with the ADEA/OWBPA machinery for employees 40+ and 2026-current disclosure and carve-out language. Answer a short interview and the draft assembles as you go, with New York already set as the governing state. Download it as PDF or Word. No fee. No account.