Unpaid Wages in Massachusetts: AG Complaints, Lawsuits, and Deadlines

If you are owed unpaid wages in Massachusetts, you have two ways to go after them: file a complaint with the Attorney General’s Fair Labor Division, or bring a private lawsuit. Win in court and the judge must triple your unpaid wages and order the employer to pay your attorney fees. You have three years from the violation to act.¹

What Counts as Wages You Can Claim

The Massachusetts Wage Act reaches further than most workers realize. Hourly pay and salary are obvious, but the same protections cover several other forms of compensation.

Commissions, once the amount has been determined and become payable under your contract or established business practice.
Accrued but unused vacation time. If your employer offers vacation and you leave with days on the books, the cash value is owed to you.
Holiday pay owed under an oral or written agreement.
Bonuses tied to objective criteria like sales targets or production goals, rather than left entirely to the employer’s discretion.

You do not need a formal written contract for vacation or holiday pay to count. A consistent company policy or a verbal promise can create the obligation.²

Overtime is also protected. Every hour past 40 in a workweek must be paid at one and a half times your regular rate, and shorting the overtime rate is a Wage Act violation carrying the same penalties as any other wage theft.³ The state minimum wage is $15.00 per hour, with a $6.75 service rate for tipped workers that must be topped up if tips do not bring total earnings to $15.00.⁴

One boundary worth naming: if your employer labels you an independent contractor, that label does not decide your status. Massachusetts presumes you are an employee unless all three prongs of the ABC test are met, meaning you are free from the employer’s direction, doing work outside the employer’s usual business, and running your own independent trade of the same type. If any prong fails, you are an employee and the Wage Act applies.⁵ Misclassification is one of the most common sources of unpaid wage claims.

When Wages Are Legally Late

Massachusetts sets firm payment deadlines that no private agreement can waive. Employers must pay weekly or bi-weekly. Weekly wages are due within six days of the end of the pay period, or seven days if you work a seven-day week. Bi-weekly wages are due within eight days of the end of the pay period.²

The rule that catches employers most often applies at the end of employment. If you are fired or laid off, every dollar you have earned, including accrued vacation and holiday pay, must be paid the day of discharge. Not the next payday. The same day. If you resign voluntarily, the employer has until the next regular payday, or the following Saturday if there is no set payday.²

Courts show no sympathy for delays. Even a one-day lag in paying a terminated employee can trigger the full penalty structure.

What You Can Recover

The civil recovery in a Massachusetts wage case is deliberately punishing. If you win, the judge must award you triple the amount of lost wages and benefits as liquidated damages. The statute says “shall,” and courts have no discretion to reduce the multiplier because the employer meant well or claims financial hardship. You also recover the costs of litigation and reasonable attorney fees.¹

The math is worth working through. If your employer owes you $5,000, the exposure in court is $15,000 plus your lawyer’s fees. Because the employer pays your attorney if you win, workers with small individual claims can often find representation that would otherwise be uneconomical.

Wage violations can also trigger criminal prosecution. A willful violation carries fines up to $25,000 or up to a year in jail on a first offense, and up to $50,000 or two years for repeat offenders. Non-willful violations carry up to $10,000 or six months on a first offense, and up to $25,000 or a year after that. The penalties reach the employer, any officer or agent responsible for payroll, and staffing agencies that participated.⁶

How to File a Complaint With the Attorney General

The Attorney General’s Fair Labor Division handles wage complaints. You can file online through mass.gov or call the hotline at 617-727-3465. Filing anonymously is allowed.⁷

Give the office as much detail as you can put together:

The employer’s legal business name and address.
Your pay rate.
The specific dates you worked without being paid properly.
Any explanation the employer gave for withholding your pay.
The total gross wages owed, before any tax withholding.

Pay stubs and employment contracts help, but you do not need to upload documents with the initial complaint. After you submit, the office reviews the claim and decides whether to investigate. The administrative process can take several months, especially when payroll records are complex. If the office declines to pursue enforcement, or if you want to move faster than the state can, you can file your own lawsuit.

Filing a Private Lawsuit

You do not have to wait for the Attorney General to finish. But there is a mandatory 90-day waiting period after you file with the AG before you can sue on your own, unless the office grants written permission to file sooner. Once that period passes, you can bring a civil action for unpaid wages, treble damages, attorney fees, and injunctive relief.¹

Private lawsuits can also be brought on behalf of other workers in the same situation, which is how wage class actions begin. If several employees at your workplace share the same complaint, that changes both the leverage and the economics of the case.

The Three-Year Deadline

You have three years from the date of the violation to file a private lawsuit. Wages owed more than three years ago are generally unrecoverable. The one important wrinkle: the three-year clock pauses while the Attorney General’s office is processing your complaint. The tolling runs from the date the AG complaint is filed until the office either issues a letter authorizing a private lawsuit or completes its own enforcement.¹

Filing with the AG first is often the smartest move for exactly this reason. It preserves your deadline while the state looks at the case, and it costs nothing. Skip the AG and go straight to court, and the three-year window keeps running from day one.

If Your Employer Retaliates

It is illegal for your employer to punish you for pursuing a wage claim. That includes firing, demoting, cutting your hours, reassigning your shifts, or any other adverse action. The protection covers filing with the Attorney General, helping in an investigation, testifying, and raising the issue internally.⁸

An employer who retaliates faces the same criminal penalties as the underlying wage violation. A retaliation claim can also be folded into your civil lawsuit, which means the treble damages formula applies to any wages you lose because of the retaliation itself. If your employer reacts badly after you speak up, document what changed and when, and bring that timeline to whoever handles your case.

1
General Court of Massachusetts. Massachusetts Code Chapter 149 Section 150 – Complaint for Violation; Civil Action
2
General Court of Massachusetts. Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 149 Section 148 – Payment of Wages
3
General Court of Massachusetts. Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 151 Section 1A – Overtime Pay
4
Mass.gov. Massachusetts Law About Minimum Wage
5
General Court of Massachusetts. Massachusetts Code Chapter 149 Section 148B – Employee Classification
6
General Court of Massachusetts. Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 149 Section 27C – Criminal Penalties
7
Mass.gov. File a Workplace Complaint
8
General Court of Massachusetts. Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 149 Section 148A – Retaliation Protections