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Unpaid wages in Pennsylvania: what the law says
My employer owes me wages
What the statute says
- Final pay detail
- Pennsylvania sets ONE deadline for both firing and quitting, and it is not a fixed number of days. WPCL s. 5 (43 P.S. s.
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260.5): 'Whenever an employer separates an employe from the payroll, or whenever an employe quits or resigns his employment, the wages or compensation earned shall become due and payable not later than the next regular payday of his employer on which such wages would otherwise be due and payable.' If the employee requests it, payment must be made by certified mail. Because the deadline is keyed to the employer's payday calendar, final_paycheck_days_fired and final_paycheck_days_quit are both omitted rather than converted into an invented day count. Separate rule for strikes/lockouts: on suspension of work from an industrial dispute, unpaid wages are likewise due no later than the next regular payday.
- Penalty for paying late
- No per-day waiting-time penalty in Pennsylvania. The functional late-payment penalty is the WPCL s. 10 liquidated damages award: it becomes available where wages remain unpaid for 30 days beyond the regularly scheduled payday (or 60 days beyond a proper claim/award where no regular payday applies), or where shortages…
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exceed 5% of gross wages payable on any two regularly scheduled paydays in the same calendar quarter - and only if 'no good faith contest or dispute of any wage claim including the good faith assertion of a right of set-off or counter-claim exists accounting for such non-payment.' The good-faith-dispute carve-out is a real limit and employers invoke it often.
- State minimum wage
- $7.25 / hour
- Overtime beyond federal law
- 1.5x the regular rate over 40 hours per work week (Minimum Wage Act s. 4(c)); weekly threshold only, no daily overtime. Pennsylvania IS stronger than the FLSA in one concrete respect: 34 Pa. Code s.
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231.43(g) fixes the regular rate for salaried non-exempt employees as total remuneration 'divided by 40 hours.' A fixed 40-hour divisor means Pennsylvania does not permit the FLSA fluctuating-workweek method of paying only an additional half-time premium, so salaried non-exempt overtime is worth more in PA than under federal law. Note the converse: PA does NOT impose a salary threshold for the white-collar exemptions above the federal one, so exempt status generally tracks the FLSA.
- Liquidated damages
- WPCL s. 10 (43 P.S. s. 260.10): liquidated damages of 'twenty-five percent (25%) of the total amount of wages due, or five hundred dollars ($500), whichever is greater,' subject to the 30-day/60-day/5%-shortage triggers and the good-faith-dispute exception. This is 25% on top of the wages, NOT a doubling or trebling.
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Separately, attorneys' fees are mandatory for a prevailing plaintiff: WPCL s. 9.1(f) provides the court 'shall, in addition to any judgment awarded to the plaintiff or plaintiffs, allow costs for reasonable attorneys' fees of any nature to be paid by the defendant.'
- Time limit to sue
- 3 years
- Who handles complaints
- Pennsylvania Department of Labor & Industry (L&I), Bureau of Labor Law Compliance (BLLC)
Read this before relying on the numbers above
Pennsylvania does not really set its own minimum wage figure. The rate schedule written into the state statute stops at $7.15, but the statute also contains an escalator that lifts the state rate to match any higher federal minimum. That is why the operative rate is $7.25, and has been since 2009. Pennsylvania makes no inflation adjustment, so the state number moves only if Congress raises the federal minimum.
Read it yourself
Official sources. If a number below matters to your case, open the statute and read it — laws get amended, and cities often stack stricter local rules on top.
- 43 P.S. s. 260.5 (Act of July 14, 1961, P.L. 637, No. 329, s. 5) — WPCL s. 5 - separations from payroll; wages due not later than next regular payday (full act text, official PA General Assembly)
- 43 P.S. s. 260.10 (Act 329 of 1961, s. 10) — WPCL s. 10 - liquidated damages of 25% of wages due or $500, whichever is greater
- 43 P.S. s. 260.9a(f), (g) (Act 329 of 1961, s. 9.1) — WPCL s. 9.1(g) - three-year limitations period; s. 9.1(f) - mandatory costs and reasonable attorneys' fees
- 43 P.S. s. 333.104(a), (a.1), (c) (Act of Jan. 17, 1968, P.L. 11, No. 5, s. 4) — Minimum Wage Act s. 4(a) rate schedule ending at $7.15 on 2007-07-01; s. 4(a.1) federal-escalator clause; s. 4(c) overtime at 1.5x over 40 hours
- 29 U.S.C. s. 206(a)(1)(C) — 29 U.S.C. 206(a)(1)(C) - federal minimum wage $7.25, the rate PA's escalator clause imports
- 34 Pa. Code s. 231.43(g) — 34 Pa. Code s. 231.43(g) - regular rate for salaried non-exempt employees = remuneration divided by 40 hours (amended May 6, 2022, eff. in 90 days, 52 Pa.B. 2701)
- 34 Pa. Code s. 231.21 — 34 Pa. Code s. 231.21 - duty to pay the rate specified in Minimum Wage Act s. 4(a); regulations current through 56 Pa.B. 3438 (June 6, 2026)
- PA L&I, Bureau of Labor Law Compliance — PA Dept. of Labor & Industry - Bureau of Labor Law Compliance, the enforcing bureau for the Minimum Wage Act and Wage Payment and Collection Law
Last checked: 2026-08-17
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