Pay Stub Requirements in New Mexico

At a glance

Requirements one by one

Five categories belong on the receipt

NMSA 1978 § 50-4-2(B) requires a “written receipt” and supplies the employee-facing field list. It must identify the employer and state the employee's gross pay, hours worked, total wages and benefits earned, and an itemized list of every deduction withheld from gross pay.

The list does not state that the receipt must show pay-period dates, the employee's name or identification number, the employer's address, hourly or overtime rates, a piece rate, net pay, tips, allowances, leave balances, or employer contributions.

Written format does not answer the electronic question

Section 50-4-2(B) calls for a written receipt but does not say whether an electronic record satisfies that requirement. It also supplies no consent, paper-copy, opt-out, printing, saving, or continuing-access rule. Electronic delivery therefore should not be described as expressly authorized or forbidden by this provision.

The payroll-record rule is agency-facing

NMSA 1978 § 50-4-9(A) requires a true and accurate record of hours worked and wages paid and sets a minimum retention period of one year after the record's entry. The rest of § 50-4-9 gives labor officials inspection and subpoena powers. It does not give a current or former employee a separate right to inspect or obtain copies, set a response deadline, or authorize a copy charge.

Enforcement is general rather than receipt-specific

NMSA 1978 § 50-4-8(A), as administered by the Labor Relations Division, requires investigation of violations and institution of enforcement actions. NMSA 1978 § 50-4-10(A)-(B) makes a violation of §§ 50-4-1 through 50-4-12 a misdemeanor; a second or later conviction carries a nonsuspendable fine of $250 to $1,000 per offense.

Those provisions do not create a receipt-specific civil damages amount, per-pay-period penalty, attorney-fee award, cure period, or limitations period. They should not be enlarged by importing an unpaid-wage remedy without a verified statutory cross-reference.

What trips people up

The receipt sentence appears inside New Mexico's semimonthly-and-monthly payday section, but the sentence itself does not say “with each payment,” “on payday,” or within a stated number of days. It is safer to report the receipt duty and the absence of a separate delivery deadline than to invent a timing phrase.

Coverage is also narrower than the word “employer” may suggest. NMSA 1978 § 50-4-1(A) excludes employers of domestic labor in private homes and employers of livestock and agricultural labor from the chapter's employer definition.

Finally, “total wages and benefits earned” is its own statutory phrase in addition to gross pay. Payroll software should not silently replace it with net pay, which the receipt sentence does not list.

Common questions

Must the receipt show the employee's name?

The statute requires the receipt to identify the employer, but it does not list the employee's name, an employee number, or Social Security number as a field.

Must the receipt show net pay?

No net-pay field appears in § 50-4-2(B)'s list. The statute instead names gross pay, total wages and benefits earned, and itemized deductions.

How long must the employer keep payroll records?

Section 50-4-9(A) states at least one year after the entry of the record. That is a retention duty for hours-worked and wages-paid records, not an express employee-copy right.

Statutes and sources

• NMSA 1978 § 50-4-1(A). Employer definition and domestic, livestock, and agricultural exclusions. Official bill text reproducing the section (accessed July 14, 2026).
• NMSA 1978 § 50-4-2(B). Written-receipt mandate and required fields. Official bill text reproducing the current section (accessed July 14, 2026).
• NMSA 1978 §§ 50-4-8(A), 50-4-9(A), and 50-4-10(A)-(B). Agency enforcement, one-year payroll records, and general criminal penalties. Official state compilation (accessed July 14, 2026).
• New Mexico DWS Labor Relations Division Investigations Manual (2025). Current agency confirmation of the Wage Payment Act's receipt, recordkeeping, and enforcement provisions. Official agency manual (accessed July 14, 2026).