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N.J.A.C. 4A:3-4.4 Salary rates for initial appointments: State service

N.J.A.C. 4A:3-4.4, Salary rates for initial appointments: State service. An appointing authority may place a new employee at a salary step up to and including the fourth step of the salary range for the employee's title. A new em Full text with 2 recorded amendments, 3 citing decisions, cited by 2 o

Classification, Services, and Compensation · Compensation

Current through New Jersey Register, Vol. 58 No. 14, July 20, 2026. Reviewed as of July 26, 2026.

This is an annotated mirror, not the official publication. Verify against the Civil Service Commission before relying on it.

In plain language

Step four is the ceiling on a starting salary. An appointing authority may place a new State employee anywhere up to and including the fourth step of the salary range for the title, and new here means somebody with no immediate prior State service with that particular appointing authority. Arriving from elsewhere in State service without a break is treated differently: an employee who separated from another State appointing authority, a State college, Rutgers, the New Jersey Institute of Technology or the University of Medicine and Dentistry and was hired without interruption may be placed up to the step they would have reached had they been employed in the new agency all along. The third mechanism reaches people already in the job. An authorized hiring rate is a set starting salary the Chairperson establishes for particular titles, and when one is established or changed, current employees in the title paid below it are advanced to it while those already at it may be advanced by the Chairperson.

Written by the NJ Civil Service Navigator editorial team from the text of N.J.A.C. 4A:3-4.4. It is a description of the rule, not the rule itself, and not legal advice.

(a) An appointing authority may place a new employee at a salary step up to and including the fourth step of the salary range for the employee's title. A new employee, for purposes of this section, is one who has had no immediate prior State service with that appointing authority. See N.J.A.C. 4A:4-7.4(b) for transfers. #

(b) When the employee has separated from another State appointing authority, a State college, Rutgers, the State University, the New Jersey Institute of Technology, or the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, and has been hired without an interruption in service, the employee may be placed up to and including that step of the salary range that the employee would receive if the employee had been continuously employed in the new agency. #

(c) An authorized hiring rate (AHR) is the set salary for initial appointments to particular job titles as established by the Chairperson. When an AHR is established or changed, current employees in such titles whose salaries are below the AHR shall be advanced to the AHR, and current employees in such titles whose salaries are the same as the AHR may be advanced by the Chairperson. #

Amendment history

Rule numbers, effective dates and New Jersey Register citations as published. 2 recorded changes.

  1. AmendedR.2017 d.100
    48 N.J.R. 2653(a); 49 N.J.R. 1182(a)
  2. AmendedR.1993 d.424
    25 N.J.R. 1916(a); 25 N.J.R. 4064(a)

How this rule has been applied

3 decisions have cited N.J.A.C. 4A:3-4.4. The list below is citations to those decisions, not the decisions. We have not written summaries for this section. A citation with no summary is deliberate: we do not paraphrase a decision we have not read. Nothing here is legal advice.

Civil Service Commission final determinations (3)

Commission decisions citing 4A:3-4.4

9 decisions of the Civil Service Commission since January 16, 2019 cite this section (denied 7, granted 1, referred for further review 1, as the minutes record the outcome). The newest:

All 9 decisions

This rule points to

Rules that point here

Elsewhere in Compensation