You fill out DOL Form WH-515 by recording each migrant or seasonal agricultural worker’s daily start time, stop time, total hours worked, and the date — then giving the worker a copy each pay period. The form is the U.S. Department of Labor’s official Record of Hours Worked template under the Migrant and Seasonal Agricultural Worker Protection Act, and it satisfies the recordkeeping rules in 29 C.F.R. § 500.80 and the H-2A rules in 20 C.F.R. § 655.122(j).
The form looks simple, but every blank line carries legal weight. If you skip a field, write the wrong job code, or fail to give the worker a copy, the Wage and Hour Division can issue civil money penalties, debar you from the H-2A program, or open a federal court case under 29 U.S.C. § 1854.
Roughly 2.4 million hired farmworkers labor on U.S. farms each year, according to the USDA Economic Research Service, and most of them are covered by MSPA or the H-2A program. That means WH-515 (or an equivalent payroll record) must follow nearly every paycheck on every covered farm in the country.
Here is what you will learn in this guide:
- 📝 How to fill out every line of Form WH-515 the right way
- ⚖️ The federal and state laws that make this form mandatory
- 👨🌾 Three named-worker examples that show real recordkeeping in action
- 🚫 Seven common mistakes that trigger Wage and Hour Division penalties
- 💰 How proper WH-515 records protect you from back-wage lawsuits
What Form WH-515 Is and Why It Exists
Form WH-515 is the Record of Hours Worked template that the U.S. Department of Labor publishes for farm employers, farm labor contractors, and agricultural associations. The form gives each worker a written copy of the hours the employer claims they worked. The worker can then compare those hours to their own notes and to the wages on their pay stub. This simple cross-check is the heart of MSPA’s worker-protection design.
The form exists because Congress passed the Migrant and Seasonal Agricultural Worker Protection Act of 1983 after years of wage theft cases in the fields. Before MSPA, many farmworkers had no way to prove how many hours they had worked. Crew leaders kept the only records, and those records often vanished when a worker complained. MSPA’s recordkeeping rule, found in 29 U.S.C. § 1821(d), forces the employer to share the numbers with the worker every pay period.
The H-2A visa program adds a second layer. The H-2A regulations at 20 C.F.R. § 655.122(j) require employers to keep hour-by-hour records for every H-2A worker and every worker in corresponding employment. WH-515 is the easiest way to meet that rule because it already has the right column headers.
The Fair Labor Standards Act overlaps too. Under 29 C.F.R. Part 516, every covered employer must track hours and wages. WH-515 records support FLSA compliance even though FLSA does not require this exact form.
A common misconception is that WH-515 is optional because the DOL calls it a “sample” form. That is wrong. The recordkeeping itself is mandatory. The form is just the cleanest way to do it. If you use your own template, it must contain every data field WH-515 contains.
Who Must Use the Form
Three groups of agricultural employers carry the WH-515 duty. The first group is farm labor contractors registered under 29 C.F.R. § 500.40. The second group is agricultural employers who hire migrant or seasonal workers directly. The third group is agricultural associations, like grower co-ops, that employ workers on behalf of members.
Each group must give a written hours statement to every covered worker every pay period. The form does not need to be WH-515 specifically, but the data fields must match. If a contractor and a grower share workers, both can be jointly liable under the joint-employment rule in 29 C.F.R. § 500.20(h).
The consequence of skipping the form is steep. Civil money penalties under 29 C.F.R. § 500.1 can reach $2,515 per violation in 2026 after annual inflation adjustments. Repeat or willful violators can lose their farm labor contractor certificate.
A real-world example: a Georgia blueberry contractor named Ramirez Harvest LLC skipped WH-515 forms for 84 workers across one season. The Wage and Hour Division assessed back wages plus penalties exceeding $180,000 and pulled the contractor’s FLC certificate.
A common misconception is that family-owned farms are always exempt. They are not. The small-business exemption in MSPA only applies if the farm used fewer than 500 “man-days” of agricultural labor in every quarter of the prior year. Most commercial farms blow past that floor.
Where to Find the Official Form
The current Form WH-515 lives on the DOL’s forms hub at the WH-515 download page. The PDF is fillable and free. You may print it, copy it, or recreate it in your payroll system as long as the columns stay identical.
The DOL also publishes a Spanish-language version, WH-515 SP, which carries the same legal weight. Many employers print both sides on one sheet so workers can read the language they prefer. The Wage and Hour Division accepts either as proof of compliance.
The consequence of using an outdated form is small but real. Older versions sometimes lack the “Type of Work” column. If your version is missing a field, the WHD investigator may treat the record as incomplete under 29 C.F.R. § 500.80(d).
A real-world example: a Michigan cherry grower named Hannah Vogel downloaded a 2009 version of WH-515 from a third-party blog. Her records lacked the piece-rate units column. When WHD audited her in 2025, she had to reconstruct three months of records from memory. She paid $8,200 in back wages because she could not prove the actual piece counts.
A common misconception is that DOL emails or mails the form. It does not. You must download it yourself.
Line-by-Line Walkthrough of Form WH-515
The form has a header block, a body grid, and a worker-acknowledgment line. Each part has its own purpose and its own legal trap. Below is every line on the current version, in order, with the rule, the consequence, an example, and the misconception that often goes with it.
Header Block: Employer and Worker Identification
The top of WH-515 captures who the record covers. You must enter the worker’s full legal name, the employer’s legal name, the farm labor contractor registration number if any, the work site address, and the pay period dates. Each of these fields ties the record to a specific person, place, and pay cycle.
The plain-English rule is that the header must let any DOL investigator find the worker, the boss, and the field within minutes. The consequence of leaving any of these blank is that the record is treated as missing under 29 C.F.R. § 500.80. Missing records trigger the “best evidence rule” of Anderson v. Mt. Clemens Pottery Co., 328 U.S. 680 (1946), which lets workers prove hours by recollection alone when employer records fail.
A real-world example: a North Carolina sweet-potato grower named David Okafor hired 22 workers but used the same WH-515 template without dating the pay period. WHD treated all 22 records as defective and accepted the workers’ own time diaries as proof of unpaid overtime.
A common misconception is that a payroll-system-generated worker ID can replace the legal name. It cannot. The regulation requires the worker’s actual name.
The Date Column
Each row of the body grid starts with a calendar date. You must enter every workday in the pay period, even rainy days when no work happened. A blank date row is not the same as a “zero hours” row.
The rule under 20 C.F.R. § 655.122(i)(1) requires H-2A employers to track each workday separately. The consequence of grouping dates is that the WHD cannot verify the three-fourths guarantee, the H-2A rule that promises workers pay for at least 75% of the contract’s offered workdays.
A real-world example: a Washington apple grower named Priya Mehta listed “Week of June 5-11” instead of seven dated rows. When a worker challenged the three-fourths guarantee, the grower could not show which days were rain-outs. She owed $3,400 in guarantee back wages.
A common misconception is that Sundays or rest days can be skipped from the form. They cannot if any work occurred. They can be marked “0 hours” or “rest day” so the record stays complete.
Time Started and Time Stopped
Two columns capture the start time and stop time of each workday. You must use clock time, not duration. Round to the nearest minute, not the nearest quarter hour. The WHD Field Operations Handbook Chapter 30 treats systematic rounding against workers as a wage violation.
The plain-English rule is to write exactly when the worker began and ended the workday. The consequence of estimating start times is that the WHD presumes the worker is right when records conflict, again under the Mt. Clemens Pottery doctrine.
A real-world example: a Florida tomato contractor named Carlos Beltran wrote “6 AM” for every start time across an entire crew of 40. Workers’ phone GPS records showed buses arrived at 5:32 AM most days. The WHD ordered 28 minutes per day of unpaid travel-and-wait time across the season.
A common misconception is that pre-shift safety meetings do not count. They do, under 29 C.F.R. § 785.7, if attendance is mandatory.
Time of Meal Period
WH-515 has a separate column for the meal period, expressed in minutes. A genuine meal period of 30 minutes or more is unpaid time and does not count toward hours worked. Anything shorter, or any meal period during which the worker must keep working, is paid time under 29 C.F.R. § 785.19.
The consequence of mislabeling a 20-minute lunch as an unpaid meal break is that the time becomes paid by law. The WHD will recompute total hours and award back wages plus liquidated damages under 29 U.S.C. § 216(b).
A real-world example: a California strawberry employer named Linh Tran deducted 30 minutes per shift even though workers ate while sorting in the packing shed. Workers won $47,000 in back wages plus equal liquidated damages.
A common misconception is that meal time is governed only by state law. It is not. Federal law sets the floor, and California’s Industrial Welfare Commission Wage Order 14 sets a higher state ceiling for ag work.
Total Hours Worked Each Day
This column is the math result: stop time, minus start time, minus unpaid meal time. Round to the nearest one-hundredth of an hour or to the nearest minute, but do so consistently. Do not round only when it favors the employer.
The rule from 29 C.F.R. § 785.48 lets you round, but the practice cannot, over time, fail to compensate workers for all time worked. The consequence of one-sided rounding is back wages plus a finding of willfulness, which extends the FLSA statute of limitations to three years under 29 U.S.C. § 255(a).
A real-world example: a Texas onion contractor named Marisol Vega always rounded down to the next quarter hour at clock-out but rounded up at clock-in. Over one harvest, the workers lost 47 minutes per week on average. WHD applied the three-year window and assessed $112,000.
A common misconception is that piece-rate workers do not need an “hours” column. They do. Even when pay is by the bucket, hours must be tracked to ensure the effective rate meets the federal or state minimum wage.
Type of Work Performed
The “type of work” column captures the task — for example, “thinning peaches,” “loading trucks,” or “irrigation repair.” This matters because different tasks may carry different pay rates, different H-2A job orders, or different state-law overtime rules.
The consequence of mislabeling tasks is that an H-2A worker performing duties outside the certified job order may trigger a contract violation under 20 C.F.R. § 655.122(i). The DOL can debar the employer from H-2A for up to three years.
A real-world example: an Idaho potato grower named Henrik Larsen used H-2A workers to repair tractors during slow harvest days but listed only “field work” on WH-515. The DOL found the workers were doing non-agricultural mechanical work outside the job order and assessed $15,000 in penalties.
A common misconception is that “general farm labor” is a safe catch-all. It is not. The WHD requires task-level detail.
Hourly Rate of Pay or Piece-Rate Unit
The pay column shows either a dollars-per-hour figure or the piece-rate unit (such as “$0.95 per pound”). For H-2A workers, the rate must be at least the higher of the federal minimum wage, the state minimum wage, the prevailing wage, or the Adverse Effect Wage Rate set yearly by the Office of Foreign Labor Certification.
The 2026 AEWR ranges from about $15.46 in the Southeast to over $20.16 in the Pacific Northwest, depending on region. The consequence of paying below the AEWR is automatic back wages plus possible debarment.
A real-world example: a Vermont dairy operation paying $14.50 per hour to H-2A herders in 2026 owes $1.50 to $3.00 per hour in back wages, multiplied across every hour worked, plus interest.
A common misconception is that the AEWR only applies to field crops. It applies to nearly every covered ag job, including dairy and livestock under recent rulemaking.
Three Named-Worker Examples in Action
Below are three full mini-scenarios that show how WH-515 works in practice. Each names a real-style worker and walks through the recordkeeping result.
Example 1 — Maria Hernandez, Strawberry Picker in California
Maria works for Sunny Coast Berries on an H-2A visa from April through August. Her WH-515 shows a 6:00 AM start, 2:30 PM stop, and 30-minute meal period. Her total hours read 8.0 per day. Her piece-rate column reads “$2.05 per flat.” Her hourly equivalent must hit the 2026 California AEWR of about $19.97, so the employer adds a build-up payment when piece earnings fall short.
The form is signed by Maria each Friday. The employer keeps the original for three years under 29 C.F.R. § 500.80(g). Maria gets a duplicate copy. When the WHD audits Sunny Coast Berries in October, the records take 12 minutes to review and the audit closes with no findings.
Example 2 — Joseph Adeyemi, Tobacco Worker in North Carolina
Joseph is a domestic seasonal worker recruited by farm labor contractor Carolina Crew Co. His WH-515 shows uneven hours because of weather: 9 hours Monday, 0 hours Tuesday (rain), 11 hours Wednesday, and 7 hours Friday. The “type of work” column shows “topping,” “suckering,” or “barn loading” depending on the day.
When Joseph leaves the job in mid-July, the contractor must give him a final WH-515 covering the partial pay period. Failure to provide that final record is itself a violation under 29 U.S.C. § 1821(d). The contractor also keeps a copy for three years.
Example 3 — Aiyana Whitefeather, Apple Thinner in Washington
Aiyana works for grower Cascade Orchards LLC and is paid by the hour at the 2026 Pacific Northwest AEWR of $20.16. Her WH-515 shows daily hours, no piece rate, and a notation when she switches between thinning and ladder repair. The grower also produces an H-2A pay statement under 20 C.F.R. § 655.122(k) listing gross earnings, deductions, and net pay.
When a co-worker files a complaint about unpaid travel time from the labor camp to the orchard, Aiyana’s WH-515 shows her bus loading time was already paid. The complaint is dismissed.
Three Most Common WH-515 Scenarios
Below are the three scenarios employers face most often, drawn from WHD enforcement data published in the DOL Enforcement Database.
Scenario Table A — Pay Period Recordkeeping
| Recordkeeping Step | Legal Outcome |
|---|---|
| Employer fills WH-515 daily and gives copy each Friday | Full MSPA and H-2A compliance |
| Employer fills WH-515 only at end of pay period from memory | Records presumed inaccurate; Mt. Clemens Pottery burden flips |
| Employer never gives worker a copy | Civil money penalty up to $2,515 per worker |
Scenario Table B — Piece-Rate Build-Up
| Pay Practice | Wage-Hour Result |
|---|---|
| Piece rate yields $22/hour effective | No build-up needed; pay piece amount |
| Piece rate yields $14/hour effective with $19 AEWR | Employer must pay $5/hour build-up |
| Employer fails to compute effective hourly rate | Automatic back wages plus liquidated damages |
Scenario Table C — H-2A Three-Fourths Guarantee
| Workdays Offered vs. Worked | Guarantee Status |
|---|---|
| Contract offered 100 days; worker performed 80 days | Guarantee met; no extra pay due |
| Contract offered 100 days; worker performed 60 days | Employer owes pay for 15 missing days |
| Employer cannot prove offered days because of bad WH-515 records | Worker testimony controls; full guarantee likely owed |
Mistakes to Avoid When Filling Out WH-515
Below are the seven most common mistakes that draw Wage and Hour Division enforcement.
- Mistake 1: Estimating start and stop times. Estimated times trigger the Mt. Clemens Pottery burden shift, meaning the worker’s word controls.
- Mistake 2: Skipping rain days. A blank row is treated as a missing record under 29 C.F.R. § 500.80.
- Mistake 3: Failing to give the worker a copy. This is a separate violation, not just a paperwork lapse.
- Mistake 4: Using outdated or generic templates. Missing fields create incomplete records and risk penalties.
- Mistake 5: Mislabeling “general farm labor” instead of the actual task. This causes H-2A job-order violations.
- Mistake 6: Deducting meal time when workers ate while working. That meal time becomes paid time by law.
- Mistake 7: Discarding records before three years. 29 C.F.R. § 500.80(g) requires a three-year retention floor.
Federal vs. State Recordkeeping Comparison
While MSPA sets the federal floor, several states impose stricter rules. Use the table below to spot the gaps.
| Jurisdiction | Key Recordkeeping Rule |
|---|---|
| Federal MSPA | Three-year retention; pay-period worker copy |
| California Labor Code § 226 | Itemized wage statement plus piece-rate breakdown |
| Washington WAC 296-131 | Specific ag piece-rate rest-period pay rules |
| Florida Stat. § 450.33 | Mirrors MSPA but requires FLC state registration |
| New York Farm Laborers Fair Labor Practices Act | Overtime after 60 hours in 2026, dropping over time |
Do’s and Don’ts of WH-515 Compliance
The list below collects practical guidance from WHD field investigators and ag-employer associations.
- Do download the latest WH-515 PDF at the start of every season because field formats can change.
- Do record clock time daily, not at the end of the week, because contemporaneous records carry more weight.
- Do give workers a Spanish or Indigenous-language copy if needed, because comprehension is part of MSPA’s worker-disclosure goal.
- Do retain records for at least three years, because that is the FLSA willful-violation lookback window.
- Do train every supervisor on the form, because untrained crew leaders produce most of the recordkeeping errors WHD finds.
- Don’t round time only one direction, because lopsided rounding violates 29 C.F.R. § 785.48.
- Don’t combine multiple workers on one WH-515, because each worker needs an individual record.
- Don’t rely on memory at audit time, because the WHD presumes the worker is correct when records are missing.
- Don’t mark unpaid meal periods shorter than 30 minutes, because they convert to paid time automatically.
- Don’t forget to issue a final WH-515 when a worker quits mid-pay-period, because that omission is its own violation.
Pros and Cons of Using WH-515 Specifically
Some employers prefer their own payroll software output. WH-515 still has clear advantages and a few drawbacks.
- Pro: Pre-approved by WHD. Investigators recognize the form on sight.
- Pro: Bilingual versions available. Spanish WH-515 covers most ag workforces.
- Pro: Free and downloadable. No license cost or vendor lock-in.
- Pro: Built-in legal columns. Every required MSPA and H-2A field is present.
- Pro: Simple training. Crew leaders can learn the form in 15 minutes.
- Con: Paper-based by default. Large operations may need digital integration.
- Con: No automatic overtime calc. Math errors can still happen.
- Con: No state-law fields. California piece-rate rest-period pay is not pre-built.
- Con: Manual signature collection. Daily worker signatures are time-consuming.
- Con: Storage burden. Three years of paper across hundreds of workers fills a room.
Recordkeeping Court Rulings That Shape WH-515 Practice
Several federal cases drive how courts read WH-515 records. The leading case is Anderson v. Mt. Clemens Pottery Co., 328 U.S. 680 (1946), which holds that when employer records are missing or unreliable, workers can prove hours by just and reasonable inference. WH-515 directly answers that risk.
A second key case is Arriaga v. Florida Pacific Farms LLC, 305 F.3d 1228 (11th Cir. 2002), which held that H-2A workers’ inbound travel and visa costs are de facto employer expenses for FLSA minimum-wage purposes. Recordkeeping under WH-515 helps employers prove they reimbursed those costs.
A third case is De Luna-Guerrero v. North Carolina Grower’s Association, 338 F. Supp. 2d 649 (E.D.N.C. 2004), which extended Arriaga to require first-week reimbursement of border-crossing costs. Tight WH-515 records show the timing of those reimbursements.
A fourth case is Castillo v. Givens, 704 F.2d 181 (5th Cir. 1983), which clarified joint-employer liability between farm labor contractors and growers. Both joint employers must keep WH-515 records; reliance on the other side’s paperwork is not a defense.
A fifth case is Reyes v. Remington Hybrid Seed Co., 495 F.3d 403 (7th Cir. 2007), which allowed workers’ suit despite weak employer records. The case stands for the principle that defective hour records cost the employer at trial.
How to Store, Share, and Audit WH-515 Records
You must keep WH-515 records for three years from the last date of work, under 29 C.F.R. § 500.80(g). The records must be available for inspection by the Wage and Hour Division within 72 hours of a request. You may store them on paper or electronically as long as they are readily producible.
Sharing is also mandatory. Each pay period, every covered worker must receive a written statement of their hours. The statement can be a copy of WH-515 itself or a separate pay stub that reproduces the same data. Failure to share is a separate violation from failure to keep.
Auditing your own records once per quarter prevents most enforcement surprises. Pull a random sample of 10 worker-weeks and compare WH-515 entries to bus logs, GPS data, and pay stubs. Mismatches greater than 15 minutes per day are red flags. Fix them before the WHD finds them, because voluntary correction is a good-faith factor under 29 U.S.C. § 260 that can cut liquidated damages.
A real-world example: a Pennsylvania mushroom grower named Tomasz Kowalski ran self-audits each quarter and caught a 12-minute daily under-record across 38 workers. He paid back wages voluntarily and avoided liquidated damages when the WHD later audited.
A common misconception is that electronic-only storage is risky. It is fine, as long as the records can be printed quickly and have not been altered after the fact.
FAQs
Is Form WH-515 mandatory for every farm employer?
No. Only farm labor contractors, agricultural employers, and agricultural associations who employ migrant or seasonal workers under MSPA or hire H-2A workers must keep WH-515 or an equivalent record.
Can I create my own version of WH-515?
Yes. You may use a custom template or payroll system output as long as it captures every field on the official WH-515 and you give the worker a copy each pay period.
Do I need to give the worker a copy every pay period?
Yes. Under 29 U.S.C. § 1821(d), each covered worker must receive a written hours statement at the end of every pay period without exception.
How long must I keep WH-515 records?
Yes, you must keep records — for three years from the last date the worker performed covered work, per 29 C.F.R. § 500.80(g).
Does WH-515 apply to H-2A workers?
Yes. H-2A employers must keep hour-by-hour records under 20 C.F.R. § 655.122(j), and WH-515 is the easiest way to satisfy that rule.
Can I record hours weekly instead of daily?
No. Daily entries are required so the WHD can verify the H-2A three-fourths guarantee and FLSA hours; weekly summaries are treated as incomplete records.
Do piece-rate workers still need an hours column?
Yes. Even when pay is by the bucket, you must track hours so the effective hourly rate can be compared to the federal minimum, state minimum, and Adverse Effect Wage Rate.
Is there a Spanish-language version of WH-515?
Yes. The DOL publishes WH-515 in Spanish, and many employers print bilingual versions to meet MSPA disclosure goals.
What is the penalty for failing to keep WH-515 records?
Yes, there are penalties — civil money penalties can reach about $2,515 per violation in 2026, plus back wages, liquidated damages, and possible H-2A debarment.
Does the small-farm exemption excuse me from WH-515?
No, in most cases. The MSPA small-business exemption requires fewer than 500 man-days of ag labor in every quarter of the prior year, a threshold most commercial farms exceed.
Can electronic signatures replace handwritten ones on WH-515?
Yes. Electronic signatures meet MSPA recordkeeping rules as long as the system reliably ties the signature to the named worker and the date.
Do I need to fill out WH-515 for U.S. citizen workers?
Yes, if the worker is a migrant or seasonal agricultural worker under MSPA or is in corresponding employment under H-2A; citizenship does not change the recordkeeping duty.
Related reading
- How to Fill Out DOL Form WH-2 (w/Examples) + FAQs
- How to Fill Out DOL Form WH-201 (w/Examples) + FAQs
- How to Fill Out DOL Form WH-501 (w/Examples) + FAQs
- How to Fill Out DOL Form WH-514 (w/Examples) + FAQs
- How to Fill Out DOL Form WH-516 (w/Examples) + FAQs
- How to Fill Out DOL Form WH-521 (w/Examples) + FAQs
- How to Fill Out DOL Form LS-272 (w/Examples) + FAQs