General Policies on Transfers in the Face of Reemployment Lists:

• Agencies may laterally transfer a permanent employee (who is eligible for transfer pursuant to Section 70.1, 70.4 or 52.6) to a position within the agency (e.g., within the Office of Mental Health, Department of Correctional Services, Office of Parks and Recreation, etc.) in the face of any reemployment roster or placement roster.

• Transfers are not permitted in the face of redeployment lists, agency reduction transfer lists or preferred lists.

• Transfers between agencies are not permitted in the face of any reemployment list.

• "Upward transfers" (one to two salary grades, or one M-grade) are not permitted in the face of any reemployment list.

General Policies on Reassignments in the Face of Reemployment Lists.

Agencies may reassign a permanent employee to a position in any location in the face of any reemployment list

Exceptions To These General Policies

However, Rule 5.8, as amended July 28, 1993, permits this department to approve certain exceptions to the above policies when agencies must redeploy staff to avoid impending or anticipated layoffs. The chart below summarizes the policies above and notes the cases in which exceptions may be made. On pages two and three (Oops! There is no page 3!) are detailed explanations of when these exceptions may be made and the procedure for requesting them.

SUMMARY OF CURRENT GENERAL POLICIES WITH EXCEPTIONS INDICATED

NO* = exceptions permitted pursuant to Rule 5.8. See next page below.

Criteria for Permitting Exceptional Transfers in the Face of Reemployment Lists for Employees Being Affected by Layoffs (Pursuant to Rule 5.8)

• Employees must be permanent in titles that have been specifically identified as likely to be affected by a planned layoff, and
• transfers can only be made to other positions within the department or agency, which means that they may occur between multiple layoff units and appointing authorities for those agencies that are so organized (such as OMRDD or SUNY), and
• while transfers pursuant to §§70.1, 70.4 and 52.6 may be made to higher graded positions (within two salary grades or one M-grade), generally these are to be avoided where other options are available, and
• as with all transfers, they require the consent of the employee.

  Although not specifically indicated in the language of Rule 5.8, our policy is to permit several additional types of appointments in the face of reemployment lists, as long as they are layoff related, i.e., they do not add employees to the agency, and are appointments made to save employees who have been specifically identified as likely to be affected by a planned layoff.

These appointments are:

• appointments to non-competitive and labor class positions
• reinstatements

• appointments from OC, Promotion, and Transition lists.
  
  These transactions will be permitted on a case-by-case basis where they reasonably meet the same criteria as is being applied for transfers. They must be cleared through your Staffing Services Representative first.

Procedures

Agencies must first supply their Staffing Services Representatives with a written layoff plan which includes time-frames, a list of the titles expected to be affected, the names and social security numbers of all of the employees in those titles, and the date of layoff or relocation.

If possible, the employees who will be transferred or reassigned or appointed under the provisions of the rule and the policies established by this memorandum should be indicated to document the necessity for these transactions.

The plan and the transactions must be approved prior to submitting any transactions to transfer, reassign or appoint staff in the face of mandatory lists.

Payroll Processing

After approval, when the transaction is submitted the "Rule 5.8" checkbox must be checked. Agencies should not call Employment Records for a clearance control number for these transactions.

Employees who are not so transferred, reassigned or appointed, or who have been transferred or permanently appointed to another non-competitive or labor class position and provided a hold as required by rule or contract, must have electronic or paper "green cards" transmitted at least 20 days prior to the date of layoff (pursuant to §81-a), and even earlier to have their names placed on placement rosters or transfer lists for certification to other agencies prior to the layoff or relocation.

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