N.Y. General Business Law 1412 – Written contracts
* § 1412. Written contracts. 1. Whenever a hiring party retains the services of a freelance worker, as such terms are defined in this article, the contract between such party and worker shall be reduced to writing. The hiring party must furnish a copy of such written contract, either physically or electronically, to the freelance worker and each party to the written contract shall retain a copy thereof.
Terms Used In N.Y. General Business Law 1412
- Contract: A legal written agreement that becomes binding when signed.
- Freelance worker: means any natural person or organization composed of no more than one natural person, whether or not incorporated or employing a trade name, that is hired or retained as an independent contractor by a hiring party to provide services in exchange for an amount equal to or greater than eight hundred dollars, either by itself or when aggregated with all contracts for services between the same hiring party and freelance worker during the immediately preceding one hundred twenty days, but does not include:
(a) any person who, pursuant to the contract at issue, is a sales representative as defined in § 191-a of the labor law;
(b) any person engaged in the practice of law pursuant to the contract at issue and who is a member in good standing of the bar of the highest court of any state, possession, territory, commonwealth or the District of Columbia and who is not under any order of court suspending, enjoining, restraining, disbarring or otherwise restricting such person in the practices of law;
(c) any person who is a licensed medical professional; or
(d) any person who is a construction contractor. See N.Y. General Business Law 1410 - Hiring party: means any person who retains a freelance worker to provide any service, other than:
(a) the United States government;
(b) the state of New York, including any office, department, agency, authority or other body of the state including the legislature and the judiciary;
(c) a municipality, including any office, department, agency or other body of a municipality; or
(d) any foreign government. See N.Y. General Business Law 1410
2. The written contract shall include, at a minimum, the following information:
(a) the name and mailing address of both the hiring party and the freelance worker;
(b) an itemization of all services to be provided by the freelance worker, the value of the services to be provided pursuant to the contract, and the rate and method of compensation;
(c) the date on which the hiring party must pay the contracted compensation or the mechanism by which such date will be determined; and
(d) the date by which a freelance worker must submit a list of services rendered under such contract to the hiring party in order to meet any internal processing deadlines of such hiring party for the purposes of compensation being timely rendered by the agreed-upon date as stipulated in paragraph (c) of this subdivision.
3. Such hiring party shall be required to keep such contract for a period of no less than six years and shall make such contract available to the attorney general upon request. The failure of a hiring party to maintain such contracts or produce such contracts to the attorney general shall give rise to a presumption that the terms that the freelance worker has presented are the agreed upon terms.
4. The commissioner of labor shall make available model contracts on the website of the department of labor for use by the general public at no cost. Such model contracts shall be made available in English and in the twelve languages most commonly spoken by limited English proficient individuals in the state.
* NB Effective August 28, 2024