U.S. Department of Labor
WARN Advisor
Who Must Be Notified?
You are required to provide notice to three separate people or organizations:
- The affected employees individually or, if they are represented by a union, to their union representative. If you give notice to a union, you must send the notice to the chief elected official of the union. It is also recommended that you provide a copy of the notice to the head of the local union representing your workers. There may be situations in which you terminate or lay off some workers who are represented and some who are not. In that situation, you must give individual notice to the un-represented workers and notice to the union for the represented workers.
In cases where there is a seniority system involving bumping rights (that is, a system in which workers with greater seniority whose jobs are abolished may replace (bump) workers with less seniority so that the worker who ultimately loses his/her job is not the worker whose job was abolished) not required by a collective bargaining agreement, you must make a good faith effort to determine who will actually lose their job as the result of the seniority system. But you are not required to predict exactly who will lose a job as a result of a seniority/bumping system. If you cannot exactly predict who will lose their job as a result of a complex seniority/bumping system, you must give notice to the person whose job is being eliminated, even though that person may later bump another worker. - The chief elected official of the local government where the employment site is located. If there is more than one local government unit, then you must notify the chief elected official of the unit to which you pay the highest taxes.
- The State Rapid Response Dislocated Worker Unit so that planning can begin for early intervention services prior to the layoff to help the dislocated workers become re-employed as quickly as possible.
Who must receive notice under WARN is addressed in Section 639.6 of the WARN regulations and discussed in the Preamble to the 1989 Final Rule.
