Seattle Secure Scheduling Ordinance Investigation: Were Your Employment Rights Violated?

Last Updated on June 25, 2026

At A Glance

This Alert Affects:: Individuals who work in retail or food service in Seattle for businesses with 500 or more employees worldwide and were subject to last-minute scheduling changes, were denied predictability pay, were required to work consecutive shifts with little rest in between or experienced other labor law violations.
What’s Going On?: Attorneys working with ClassAction.org believe that employers in Seattle may have violated certain pay and scheduling rights afforded to employees by the Seattle Secure Scheduling Ordinance, and they’re looking into whether lawsuits can be filed on behalf of affected workers.
How Could a Lawsuit Help?: If filed and successful, a Secure Scheduling Ordinance lawsuit could help affected Seattle employees recover unpaid wages and other damages, with interest, and could potentially force employers to alter their business practices to better comply with local law.
What Can You Do?: If you work in retail or food service in Seattle for a business with 500 or more employees worldwide and received your schedule with less than 14 days’ notice, were pressured to accept last-minute shift changes, were denied predictability pay, or were scheduled to work with less than 10 hours of rest between shifts without consent or premium pay, fill out the form on this page to help the investigation.
Could I Get Fired?: Local law prohibits employers from retaliating against workers for exercising their protected rights, including filing or participating in a lawsuit.

Attorneys working with ClassAction.org are investigating whether class action lawsuits can be filed on behalf of food service and retail employees in Seattle for potential violations of their employment rights under local law.

Specifically, the attorneys believe that some Seattle employers may be violating the Seattle Secure Scheduling Ordinance, which went into effect on July 1, 2017.

Fill out the form on this page if you work in food service or retail in Seattle for an employer with 500 or more employees worldwide and you:

Received your schedule with less than 14 days’ notice;
Were pressured to accept last-minute shift changes;
Were scheduled for “clopening” or other consecutive shifts without 10 hours’ rest between closing and opening without giving consent and receiving premium pay;
Were not given predictability pay when your schedule was changed on short notice;
Were not given a good-faith estimate of anticipated work hours upon hire and every year thereafter; and/or
Were denied your right to decline added hours.

You could be entitled to unpaid wages and other damages.

What Is the Seattle Secure Scheduling Ordinance?

The Seattle Secure Scheduling Ordinance is a local law that offers pay and employment protections to all employees covered by the city’s Minimum Wage Ordinance who specifically work:

In retail or food service;
For an employer with 500 or more employees worldwide;
At a fixed, point-of-sale location; and
In Seattle at least 50% of the time.

Additionally, if an employee works at a full-service restaurant, the company must have at least 40 full-service locations globally for its Seattle employees to be covered by the Secure Scheduling Ordinance.

How Far in Advance Does My Schedule Have to Be Set?

According to the Seattle Secure Scheduling Ordinance, an employer must provide each employee, upon hire and then annually thereafter, with a good-faith estimate of the median hours they can expect to work.

Once hired, an employee must be given their schedule in writing at least 14 days in advance.

Additionally, employees must be allowed to discuss preferences for the times and locations at which they are scheduled with their employers, and employers, per the ordinance, “must grant requests about ‘major life events’ unless there is a bona fide business reason to deny it.” A major life event, the law defines, is an important event that affects an employee’s ability to work certain times or locations due to changes in health, housing or transportation, caregiving responsibilities, other jobs or enrollment in career training or educational programs.

How Are Scheduling Changes Handled?

The Seattle Secure Scheduling Ordinance provides that, with a few exceptions, employers must provide additional pay to employees if their schedule is changed on shorter notice than 14 days.

Covered employees are owed certain additional compensation, called predictability pay, for instances in which their schedules are made less predictable, the law states. Specifically, employees are owed one hour of pay for an increase in hours, or for a change to the start time, end time or day of a shift with no loss of hours. They are owed pay for half the hours not worked for a reduction of hours, a canceled shift or any on-call hours when the employee is not called in to work.

Notably, increases or reductions of less than 15 minutes do not necessitate extra pay, and additions of more than 15 minutes but less than an hour can be prorated.

The ordinance also states that no payment is required for schedule changes if:

The employee requested the change;
Two employees swapped shifts;
The employee responded to a mass message about hours that became available because another employee could not work;
The reduction of hours was a disciplinary action;
The change occurred because business operations could not start or continue due to a natural disaster or weather event, threats to employees or the property, recommendation by a public official or failed utilities, or because it would cause the employer to violate a law.

The Seattle Secure Scheduling Ordinance also provides employees the right to refuse any hours not originally posted on the schedules given 14 days in advance. It also mandates that employers offer additional work hours to qualified, current employees by posting notice of the additional hours for at least three days before hiring new employees.

“Clopening” Shifts and Your Right to Rest

The Seattle Secure Scheduling Ordinance states that an employee’s shifts must be at least 10 hours apart, a rule that’s most commonly applicable to “clopening” shifts—i.e., instances in which an employee is scheduled to work both the closing shift one night and the opening shift the next morning.

If an employee voluntarily agrees to work a “clopening” shift with less than 10 hours in between closing and opening, the law dictates that they must be paid time-and-a-half for the hours worked that are less than 10 hours apart.

How Could a Seattle Secure Scheduling Ordinance Lawsuit Help?

If filed and successful, a Seattle Secure Scheduling Ordinance lawsuit could force employers found in violation to alter their business practices to align with the law.

A lawsuit could also help affected employees recover unpaid wages, interest, predictability pay and other potential damages they might be owed for violations of their rights.

What You Can Do

If you work in retail or food service for an applicable employer and you suspect your Secure Scheduling Ordinance rights may have been violated, attorneys want to hear from you.

Fill out the form on this page if you:

Received your schedule with less than 14 days’ notice;
Were pressured to accept last-minute shift changes;
Were scheduled for “clopening” shifts without 10 hours’ rest between closing and opening;
Weren’t given predictability pay;
Weren’t given a good-faith estimate of anticipated work hours both upon hire and every year thereafter;
Were denied your right to decline added hours; and/or
Were denied premium pay if you agreed to work with less than 10 hours between shifts.

It doesn’t cost anything to reach out or learn more about the investigation, and you don’t have to take any legal action if you decide not to.

It is important to note that retaliation by employers against workers who exercise their legal rights (including by filing a lawsuit) is illegal under local labor law.

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