Bed Bath and Beyond is making major cutbacks the company based in Union, New Jersey is closing 43 stores two warehouses and one fulfillment center and that means layoffs 377 jobs will be cut but here's the catch the company's making these Cuts just a day before a new law takes effect in New Jersey that will require large businesses like Bed Bath and Beyond with a hundred or more workers to pay Severance when they lay off at least 50 people that Severance one week of pay for every year worked at the company by laying off their workers on April 9th instead of the 10th when the law kicks in the company stands to save millions of dollars senior reporter for Business Insider Dominick Reuter has been covering the issue and he joins me now Dominick, thanks so much for being with us today just tell us what you think about the timing of these layoffs coming on April 9th just a day before the new state law is going to take effect I think the timing and the layoffs coming on from Bed Bath and Beyond are very difficult to explain with almost any other rationale except for the the timing that is outlined from the law that Governor Murphy signed back in January that set April 10th as a deadline or a new Severance requirement for large companies so you know folks in the business Community might argue hey this is a smart move because if the company waited another day they're going to be facing possibly millions in additional payments several Severance payments to their workers where does this leave the workers in terms of the kind of money that they could be seeing that they're missing out on so the law as written was specifically designed to call back to the days of Toys R Us when it went under and left a lot of retail workers high and dry they categorically wanted to avoid lawmakers in New Jersey and Trenton specifically wanted to avoid this issue um on the other hand Bed Bath and Beyond does not have a lot of cash right now and by my estimates they would be facing many many millions of dollars of mandatory Severance payments above and beyond with the federal government currently requires so this is a sweeping new rule that a lot of Business Leaders do not like to that point a lot of Business Leaders in New Jersey have long said the state is not friendly for business that there are a lot of rules here that might be protections for workers but make it hard to keep a business afloat could more workers potentially be laid off if Bed Bath and Beyond had filed on the 10th and had to pay these millions could we see actually more workers out of a job the new rule does go into effect on April 10th and that means that any future layoffs any future notice that is given is going to require this new framework part of what is uh compelling about this situation now is that that and Beyond apparently is seeking to get a large number of terminations under out the door that it may have been trying to hold out a little longer maybe questionable cases that it decided it did not want to take the risk after April 10th do you think that there could be some repercussions here that the workers might have any legal or otherwise challenge against Bed Bath and Beyond because of this timing so I'm aware of a class action suit that was filed on Friday one Harman store manager is um saying that he and similarly situated plaintiffs were denied enough notice under the Warren act um unfortunately the rules don't treat retail workers very favorably the the the current iteration of federal Warren law of federal layoff rules which which Most states follow is designed for plants for full-time workers which is why New Jersey tried to make a new rule that tailored to the retail industry but we will have to see how it shakes out for future closures that happen after April 10th Dominick Reuter thank you so much thank you support for the business report provided by New Jersey American Water we keep life flowing online at new jerseyamwater.com