158 | Massachusetts Wage & Hour Peculiarities, 2025 ed. © 2025 Seyfarth Shaw LLP requirements and prohibits employers from discriminating against persons because of their service in the National Guard, the Armed Forces Reserve, or other uniformed services.963 5. Time Off to Vote Under Massachusetts law, an employee in a manufacturing, mechanical, or mercantile establishment who is eligible to vote is entitled to time off to do so during the two-hour period after the polls open, if the employee requests the time.964 Because most polling places open early in the morning, this type of leave is generally unnecessary. Employers need not pay employees for this time.965 XII. OTHER MISCELLANEOUS MASSACHUSETTS LAWS A. Massachusetts Personnel Records Law The Massachusetts Personnel Records Law966 requires an employer with twenty or more employees to maintain certain information or documents (to the extent they are available) within an employee’s “personnel record.” “Personnel record” is defined broadly to include any record that identifies an employee “to the extent that the record is used or has been used, or may affect or be used relative to that employee’s qualifications for employment, promotion, transfer, additional compensation or disciplinary action.”967 The statute specifies that the following information be included in the personnel record: name, address, date of birth, job title and description, rate of pay, compensation paid to the employee, starting date of employment, job application of the employee, résumés or other forms of employment inquiry submitted by the employee to the employer in response to its advertisement, performance evaluations, written warnings of substandard performance, lists of probationary periods, any waivers signed by the employee, copies of dated termination notices, and any other documents relating to disciplinary action regarding the employee.968 In 2010, the law was amended to impose an affirmative duty upon an employer to notify an employee within ten days of placing negative information into the employee’s personnel record if the “information is, has been used or may be used, to negatively affect the employee’s qualification for employment, promotion, transfer, additional compensation or the possibility that the employee will be subject to disciplinary action.”969 The statute provides little guidance as to 963 38 U.S.C. §§ 4301-4335. Both veterans and active members of the military are protected by the Massachusetts Fair Employment Practices Act. M.G.L. ch. 151, § 4. 964 M.G.L. ch. 149, § 178. 965 Office of Massachusetts Attorney General, Time Off to Vote, available at http://www.mass.gov/guides/breaks-and-time-off (last visited Mar. 5, 2025). 966 M.G.L. ch. 149, § 52C. 967 Id. 968 Id. 969 Id.
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