Delaware Severance Pay Laws (2026): WARN Act and Severance Rules

No Delaware law requires an employer to pay severance as such. Delaware does have two laws that put money in laid-off workers' hands. The Delaware WARN Act (19 Del. C. ch. 19) makes an employer with 100 or more employees that skips 60 days' notice of a covered layoff pay back pay and benefits for up to 60 days. And if your employer promised severance, the Wage Payment and Collection Act treats that "separation" pay as a benefit that must be paid within 30 days after it is due (19 Del. C. 1109).

For how other states handle severance and the full federal rules, see our severance pay laws by state guide.

Information last verified on October 8, 2026. This article has not been reviewed by a licensed lawyer.

Jurisdiction scope: This article covers Delaware law on severance pay: the Delaware Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (19 Del. C. 1901-1911) and its regulation, the Wage Payment and Collection Act (19 Del. C. ch. 11), and the unemployment rules in 19 Del. C. 3302, with short notes on the federal rules that apply in Delaware. It does not cover when your last regular paycheck is due; see Delaware final paycheck laws. It does not cover benefit amounts or how to file for unemployment; see Delaware unemployment benefits.

Is severance pay required in Delaware?

No Delaware statute we found requires severance. We read the full text of the Title 19 chapters on employment practices, wage payment, the Delaware WARN Act and unemployment compensation, and searched them for "severance," "separation" and "dismissal." "Severance" appears only in the WARN Act's notice rule, which requires an employer to describe any severance packages it will offer; it does not require the employer to offer one.

This finding rests on those chapters. We did not search Title 29 (state employees) or the public-employee bargaining chapters, and we could not run the General Assembly's own bill search for 2025-2026 bills (see the last section).

Federal law does not fill the gap. The U.S. Department of Labor says the Fair Labor Standards Act does not require severance pay and that severance is a matter of agreement between employer and employee. Whether your employer could end your job in the first place is a separate question, covered on our Delaware at-will employment page.

The Delaware WARN Act

Delaware has its own WARN Act, separate from the federal one. House Bill 409 created it; the Governor signed it on July 11, 2018, and it took effect January 7, 2019. The bill as introduced would have covered employers with 50 or more employees, but the enacted law covers employers with 100 or more, so summaries that say 50 describe a version that did not pass.

The core rule is in 19 Del. C. 1904(a):

"An employer may not order a mass layoff, plant closing, or relocation if the mass layoff, plant closing, or relocation will cause an employment loss unless, at least 60 days before the order takes effect, the employer gives written notice of the order to all of the following"

Who is covered and what triggers notice

The state regulation tells employers to look 30 days ahead and 30 days behind when applying these thresholds (19 DE Admin. Code 1103, Reg. 3.1.1). Government employers are not covered (1903(4)).

Who gets notice and what it must say

The 60-day written notice goes to the affected employees and their representatives, to the Department of Labor's Division of Employment and Training (its WARN Act Administrator), and to the local Delaware Workforce Development Board (1904(a)).

Beyond the items federal WARN requires, a Delaware notice must list each planned dislocated worker's name, job title, home address, phone number and email address, and state whether the employer is self-insured for workers' compensation. It must also give "general information regarding any payouts, severance packages, job relocation opportunities and retirement options that will be offered" (1904(b)).

Shorter notice is allowed for a faltering company seeking capital, unforeseeable business circumstances, a temporary facility or project, a natural disaster, or a strike or lockout (1905). An employer relying on one of those exceptions must give as much notice as practicable and a brief statement of why notice was shortened (1905(b)). No notice is required at all when a layoff is caused by a physical calamity, terrorism or war (1904(c)).

What an employer owes for skipping notice

An employer that orders a covered layoff without the required notice is liable to each employee who was entitled to it (1909(a)-(b)):

• Back pay at the higher of the employee's average regular rate over the last 3 years or final rate.
• Benefits the employee would have had, including covered medical expenses.
• For the period of the violation, up to 60 days or one-half the number of days employed, whichever is smaller.

The amount is reduced by wages paid during the violation period (other than accrued vacation), voluntary and unconditional payments, payments to third parties for the employee's benefits, and any federal WARN liability (1909(d)). The Act says these payments "shall not be construed as wages," and unemployment benefits may not be denied or reduced because of them (1909(c)).

The employer also faces a civil penalty of $1,000 per day or $100 per day for each dislocated worker, whichever is greater. The penalty is not owed if the employer pays employees what it owes them within 3 weeks of ordering the layoff (1910(a)), and it cannot exceed the federal maximum (1910(b)).

How it is enforced

The Secretary of Labor may investigate and hold administrative hearings (1908). An aggrieved employee, a local government or an employee representative may also bring a civil action within 3 years of the violation, and a prevailing plaintiff recovers attorney's fees (1909(g)). A court cannot block the layoff itself with an injunction (1909(h)).

Delaware's rights are in addition to any contract or other legal rights, and the notice periods run at the same time (1911). Federal WARN also applies: it requires 60 days of notice from employers with 100 or more employees not counting part-time employees, or 100 or more employees, counting part-time employees, who together work at least 4,000 hours a week, not counting overtime (29 U.S.C. 2101(a)(1)), and an employer that skips it owes back pay and benefits for up to 60 days, enforced only in federal court (29 U.S.C. 2101-2104). Our severance pay laws guide covers the federal rules.

Promised severance under the Wage Payment and Collection Act

Delaware's wage law covers severance that an employer has agreed to pay. Under 19 Del. C. 1109(a), an employer that is party to an agreement to provide benefits or wage supplements "shall pay the amount or amounts necessary to provide such benefits or furnish such supplements within 30 days after such payments are required to be made." Section 1109(b) defines "benefits or wage supplements" to include "vacation, separation or holiday pay."

The Act cannot be signed away. Section 1110 provides: "Except as provided in this chapter, no provision of this chapter may in any way be contravened or set aside by private agreement."

What the courts have said

In Girardot v. The Chemours Company, C.A. No. N17C-10-148 MMJ (Del. Super. Ct. Mar. 26, 2018), the Superior Court, ruling on a motion to dismiss, held: "This Court holds that severance pay is recoverable under the DWPCA." It treated severance calculated by years of service as a "separation" benefit under 1109(b), enforceable through the Act's civil action in 1113.

Girardot is a trial-court decision, so it persuades other courts but does not bind them. It treated a contrary statement in an earlier Delaware Supreme Court opinion as dicta, and we did not check whether any later court has followed or rejected Girardot.

Who the Act does not cover

The Wage Payment and Collection Act does not apply to federal, State of Delaware or local government employees, or to independent contractors (1101(a)(4)-(5)). If your severance comes from a formal company plan, federal law may govern it instead: ERISA supersedes state laws that relate to covered employee benefit plans (29 U.S.C. 1144(a)), and the U.S. Department of Labor says its Employee Benefits Security Administration may assist an employee who did not receive severance under an employer-sponsored plan.

When must severance be paid in Delaware?

Promised severance is due within 30 days after the date the agreement requires it to be paid (1109(a)). Girardot says that if a severance agreement requires payment at termination, a claim under 1109 accrues 30 days after termination.

Final wages follow a different rule. Under 1103(a), wages earned are due on the later of the next regular payday covering the last day worked or three business days after the last day worked. For wages unpaid without a reasonable dispute, 1103(b)(2) adds liquidated damages of the lesser of 10% of the unpaid wages per day or an amount equal to the unpaid wages. Whether those liquidated damages apply to a severance claim under 1109 was not resolved in the sources we reviewed. For your last regular paycheck, see Delaware final paycheck laws.

How to claim unpaid severance in Delaware

The Department of Labor's Office of Labor Law Enforcement, Wage and Hour Unit, enforces the wage payment law; complaints go to Wages@Delaware.gov or (302) 761-8200, option 3. Its page does not say whether it accepts a complaint about severance alone. Under 1113, an employee can also bring a civil action in any court, the Department can sue to collect, and a judgment must include costs and reasonable attorney's fees. The Department can also impose a civil penalty of $1,000 to $5,000 per violation (1112(a)).

Deadlines

Girardot applied the older one-year period that existed before the 2023 amendment.

Severance and Delaware unemployment benefits

Severance counts as wages for Delaware unemployment. Under 19 Del. C. 3302(27), "wages" for unemployment purposes means all remuneration for personal services, including "dismissal payments." A person is unemployed in a week in which they perform no services and "no wages are payable," or in a week of less than full-time work if the wages payable are less than the weekly benefit amount plus the greater of $10 or 50% of the weekly benefit amount (3302(26)).

Two kinds of payment are excluded from wages: vacation pay paid during or incident to unemployment (3302(28)(D)), and Delaware WARN payments for missed notice (3302(28)(F); 1909(c)).

The Department of Labor's Claimant Handbook lists dismissal payments and severance pay among the wages you must report, in the week earned rather than the week received. Its claimant FAQ says: "if you are collecting severance pay, or are going to be collecting severance pay, file your application as soon as you become unemployed." The FAQ adds that your answers about severance "will help determine the impact severance pay may, or may not, have on your eligibility for benefits."

Neither the statute nor the Department's pages say how a lump sum is spread across weeks or by how much benefits are reduced. Ask the Division of Unemployment Insurance when you file. For benefit amounts and filing, see Delaware unemployment benefits.

What a Delaware severance agreement can and cannot require

Apart from the wage-law and unemployment rules below, we found no Delaware statute that limits release, confidentiality or non-disparagement terms in a private severance agreement, and no state review or revocation period. We searched the Title 19 chapters on employment practices (including the sexual harassment provisions in 711A), wage payment and related chapters; this is a keyword search of those chapters, not the whole Code.

Releases of wage claims

The Wage Payment and Collection Act limits releases tied to pay that is conceded to be due. Section 1104(b) makes "any release required or obtained by an employer as a condition to payment" of those wages "null and void," and 1110 bars setting aside the chapter by private agreement. Because Girardot treats severance as a 1109 benefit under the same chapter, those sections may bear on a release demanded as a condition of paying severance an employer concedes it owes, but we found no Delaware decision applying them to a negotiated severance release.

Unemployment rights cannot be signed away

A release in a severance agreement cannot take away your right to unemployment benefits. Under 19 Del. C. 3371(a), "Any agreement by an individual to waive, release or commute the individual's rights to benefits or any other rights under this chapter shall be void," and 3371(c) bars an employer from requiring or accepting "any waiver of any right hereunder by any individual in the employer's employ."

Non-compete terms in a severance agreement

Delaware courts review an ordinary non-compete for reasonableness, but a clause that makes you give up or repay money if you go to work for a competitor is treated differently: in LKQ Corp. v. Rutledge (Dec. 18, 2024), the Delaware Supreme Court held that such forfeiture-for-competition provisions are not reviewed for reasonableness when the employee left voluntarily, while leaving open whether an extreme clawback might be. The court stated that rule for an employee who quit, so it may not settle the question for someone who was laid off.

Federal limits that also apply

These federal rules apply in Delaware; our severance pay laws guide explains each:

• Workers 40 and older. A release of federal age-discrimination claims must give you at least 21 days to consider it (45 days in a group layoff) and 7 days to revoke it after signing (29 U.S.C. 626(f)).
• Sexual harassment and assault. Under the Speak Out Act, a nondisclosure or non-disparagement clause agreed to before such a dispute arises cannot be enforced in court when the conduct is alleged to violate federal, tribal or state law (42 U.S.C. 19403).
• Labor-law rights. The NLRB's McLaren Macomb decision, 372 NLRB No. 58 (2023), bars severance agreements that require employees to broadly give up their National Labor Relations Act rights. The NLRB's General Counsel is arguing to overrule it in Valley Radiology, P.A. (10-CA-324512), an open case, so the decision remains Board law until the Board acts.

Delaware tax withholding on severance

The Division of Revenue's employer guide says "wages" for withholding covers all types of employee pay, including "earned severance pay." When severance is paid separately from regular wages, the employer annualizes regular wages and computes the tax, annualizes regular plus supplemental wages and computes the tax, and withholds the difference.

Reading a Delaware severance offer

If you were laid off with 50 or more coworkers, ask whether your employer gave a Delaware WARN notice; the notice must describe any severance packages on offer, and missing notice carries its own back-pay remedy. Keep the agreement or policy that promises severance, note the date it says payment is due, and count 30 days from there under 1109. Report severance when you file for unemployment. Our severance pay laws guide has general guidance on reading and negotiating an offer.

Recent Delaware changes and pending bills

We could not run a keyword search of 2025-2026 bills on the General Assembly's website, so we cannot say whether any bill on severance, WARN or separation agreements is pending. Check the General Assembly's bill pages before relying on the absence of one.

Related

• Severance pay laws by state
• Delaware unemployment benefits
• Delaware final paycheck laws
• Delaware at-will employment laws

Disclaimer: This article provides general legal information about Delaware severance pay law (the Delaware WARN Act, 19 Del. C. 1901-1911, the Wage Payment and Collection Act, 19 Del. C. ch. 11, and 19 Del. C. 3302) and the federal laws that apply in Delaware. It is not legal advice. The information was verified on October 8, 2026. For advice about your situation, contact the Delaware Department of Labor, a legal aid office or a lawyer licensed in Delaware.

Last updated: October 8, 2026.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is severance pay required by law in Delaware?

No. We found no Delaware statute requiring severance. But if an employer agreed to pay it, the Wage Payment and Collection Act treats separation pay as a benefit due within 30 days after the agreed payment date (19 Del. C. 1109).

Does Delaware have its own WARN Act?

Yes. The Delaware WARN Act (19 Del. C. ch. 19) requires employers with 100 or more employees to give 60 days' written notice of a covered plant closing, mass layoff or relocation to employees, the Department of Labor and the local workforce board.

What happens if my employer did not give Delaware WARN notice?

The employer owes back pay and benefits for each day of the violation, up to 60 days or half the days you were employed, whichever is smaller (19 Del. C. 1909), and a civil action must be brought within 3 years of the violation (1909(g)).

Is severance considered wages in Delaware?

Delaware's wage law classes it as a benefit or wage supplement, which 19 Del. C. 1109(b) defines as compensation other than wages and which includes separation pay, and the Superior Court held in Girardot v. Chemours (2018) that severance is recoverable under that Act.

How long do I have to sue for unpaid severance in Delaware?

For claims accruing on or after April 26, 2023, the deadline is 2 years (10 Del. C. 8111). Under Girardot, a 1109 severance claim accrues 30 days after the payment was required.

Does severance affect unemployment in Delaware?

It can. Dismissal payments are wages under 19 Del. C. 3302(27), and the Department of Labor tells claimants to report severance pay in the week earned. Delaware WARN payments for missed notice do not reduce benefits (1909(c)).

Should I wait until my severance ends to file for unemployment in Delaware?

The Department of Labor's claimant FAQ says that if you are collecting or will collect severance, you should file your application as soon as you become unemployed.

How long do I have to sign a severance agreement in Delaware?

We found no Delaware statute setting a review or revocation period. If you are 40 or older, federal law gives you at least 21 days to consider a release of age claims, 45 in a group layoff, and 7 days to revoke it (29 U.S.C. 626(f)).