© 2025 Seyfarth Shaw LLP Massachusetts Wage & Hour Peculiarities, 2025 ed. | 189 the employee must sign it personally (the signature of an attorney acting as the employee’s agent will not suffice). Wage assignments of over $3,000 are not valid unless the employee receives a copy of the assignment upon its execution. The employer must also receive a written copy, accompanied by an account listing the balance due, the amount already repaid, and the date of every payment along with an indication of whether the payment will apply to interest, principal, or other loan fees. Wage assignments of over $3,000 are only valid for two years.1188 If a wage assignment meets the applicable statutory requirements, it will be enforceable even if the employee later declares bankruptcy.1189 Nonetheless, wage assignments cannot interfere with deductions from wages for union dues or health insurance premiums, or drop the employee’s pay below minimum wage.1190 B. Garnishments While wage assignments are voluntary arrangements between employees and third parties, garnishments are involuntary. Wages are typically garnished when a court orders an employer to withhold a portion of an employee’s after-tax earnings to repay a debt owed to a third party.1191 Wage garnishments are carefully regulated to avoid abuse by predatory lenders and to ensure that unrestricted garnishments do not encourage employers to terminate employees subject to garnishments because the employees are perceived as untrustworthy.1192 Massachusetts law and the federal garnishment statute, known as the Consumer Credit Protection Act (CCPA), regulate garnishments in different ways.1193 In general, the law permitting the smallest garnishment controls.1194 Because the Massachusetts law governing garnishments is more restrictive in some ways, but federal law is more restrictive in other ways, employers must be aware of both the state and federal requirements. Employers should comply with the more restrictive rule in any given situation. As detailed below, when net wages are garnished pursuant to child or spousal support orders, the employee receives less protection under both state and federal law. 1. Calculating Garnishments Under Massachusetts Law and the CCPA Under both Massachusetts and federal law, a certain portion of an employee’s wages are exempt from garnishment, although the laws differ on how this exempt amount is calculated. 1188 Id. 1189 See Citizens’ Loan Ass’n, 196 Mass. at 532 (“The assignment to the plaintiff is a lien which . . . was not affected by the discharge in bankruptcy of the assignor.”). See also Raulines v. Levi, 232 Mass. 42, 44 (1919) (“[i]f valid in its inception the assignment remained in force notwithstanding the discharge of the plaintiff in bankruptcy”). 1190 See M.G.L. ch. 154, § 8; M.G.L. ch. 151, § 1 (setting the Massachusetts minimum wage). 1191 15 U.S.C. § 1672(c) (“The term ‘garnishment’ means any legal or equitable procedure through which the earnings of any individual are required to be withheld for payment of any debt.”); DOL Wage & Hour Fact Sheet #30 (Oct. 2020) (wages can also be garnished by the IRS or state tax collection agency levies for unpaid taxes and by federal agencies for non-tax debts owed to the federal government). 1192 15 U.S.C. § 1671(a)(1)-(2). 1193 15 U.S.C. § 1671 et seq.; M.G.L. ch. 246, § 28. 1194 15 U.S.C. § 1677(1).
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