N.J.A.C. 4A:3-3 Classification
Every section of N.J.A.C. 4A:3-3, Classification: 12 rules with full text, amendment history and citing decisions.
- 4A:3-3.1Classification of positions
This is where a job specification comes from. Every position in the career and unclassified services is assigned to a job title by the Civil Service Commission, and for career service positions the assignment is made on the basis of job analysis. The title has to do three things: describe the duties and the level of supervision both exercised and received, set the minimum education and experience qualifications needed for successful performance, and in State service fix the level of compensation. So a specification is not an advertisement, it is the instrument deciding what the work is, who is qualified for it, and what it pays. Assigned titles are used in every personnel and payroll record including budgets, though an appointing authority may use a friendlier descriptive title for other purposes such as correspondence with the public. Title language must avoid specifying or implying a fixed gender. Disputes about whether a position carries the right title have their own procedure.
- 4A:3-3.2Establishment of classification plans
A classification plan is three lists: the job titles, a specification for each one, and the job bands titles have been assigned to. A specification is a descriptive summary of the duties and responsibilities of a position, or of a group of positions similar enough in content to share a single title, which is why one specification can cover an entire title series or job band with the distinctions between levels written into its text. Anyone reading a specification that seems to describe several jobs at once is reading that provision working as intended. The Commission maintains plans for the career, senior executive and unclassified services alike, and uses the same job titles in the State and local plans to the extent feasible, which is why a local title often matches a State one exactly. The cross-reference this section gives for job bands points at a section that is now reserved.
- 4A:3-3.2A(Reserved)
Reserved. No rule text is currently published at this citation.
- 4A:3-3.3Administration of classification plans
The upkeep behind a classification plan, and the one section naming employee relations group changes as something that triggers union notice. The Chairperson or designee classifies new positions and reclassifies existing ones through job analysis, creates titles, abolishes unnecessary ones, consolidates titles where a single one fits a group of positions with similar qualifications, authority and responsibility, and modifies specifications to keep them accurate. Appointing authorities owe prompt notice of new positions, of organisational changes, and of changes in the duties of individual positions, plus updated organisation charts every year. Any position may be job audited. In State service each department and autonomous agency names an agency representative as the liaison on classification and compensation. That representative must notify affected and potentially affected negotiations representatives of six kinds of submission, including reorganisations, new title requests, specification modifications, employee relations group changes, and the setting up or ending of flexitime and alternate workweek programs. A Commission representative verifies the notice was actually given.
- 4A:3-3.4Title appropriate to duties performed
One sentence, running in both directions. Nobody may be appointed or employed under a title that does not fit the duties to be performed, and nobody holding a title may be assigned duties that do not properly pertain to it, unless law or these rules provide otherwise. That second half is the out-of-title work prohibition, and it is the substantive rule that a position review request enforces. The section states the prohibition and nothing else. It attaches no remedy, no back pay and no deadline, so anyone acting on a violation is working from the position review request and appeal procedure rather than from this text.
- 4A:3-3.5Reclassification of positions
The trigger is drift. When a position duties change so much that they no longer resemble the specification and the title no longer fits, the Chairperson or designee reclassifies the position to a more appropriate title, establishes a new title for it, or takes other action based on how the appointing authority is organised. Read subsection (c)1 before assuming a reclassification determination means a new title. Within 30 days of receiving the determination the appointing authority picks one of three responses: make the classification change, assign duties commensurate with the title the employee already holds, or reassign the employee to duties they have permanent rights to. Two of those three take the higher work away rather than granting the higher title. Nothing takes effect until affected permanent employees are notified and an appropriate Commission representative approves. An employee in the career or unclassified service, in State or local service, may appeal a reclassification determination, as may a local appointing authority.
- 4A:3-3.6New titles
The request has to argue against itself. An appointing authority asking for a new title must explain in writing not just why the new title is needed but why an existing title cannot be used and why its specification cannot simply be modified, and must name any title the new one would abolish or replace. The Commission creates a title where the positions under review carry a new set of functions that no existing title or series describes properly. Once the need is found, specifications are drafted and, in State service, the title is evaluated for compensation purposes. While that is pending the positions may be labelled Tentative Title, which carries its own salary treatment. Effective dates are mechanical in State service: the pay period beginning after 14 days from when the Commission representative received the request and all requested information, or the date of appointment to the Tentative Title. In local service a Commission representative sets an appropriate date.
- 4A:3-3.7Trainee, apprentice, recruit, and intern titles
Advancement out of a trainee title requires no promotional examination. The appointing authority certifies that the training period was completed successfully, along with anything extra the primary title specification demands such as a licence, additional training or a proficiency standard, and the employee is regularly appointed to the primary title. Two consequences run the other way. Failure by a permanent employee to complete the training period is a cause for separation, and failing the working test period in the primary title carries no right to return to the trainee title. A trainee training period runs no longer than 12 months unless law provides otherwise, while apprentice and intern periods run at least 12 months and no longer than the specification allows. The period must be continuous unless leave or layoff interrupts it, may include provisional service in a trainee title, and may include service in a higher related title. It can be shortened only if every qualifying employee in the same title and appointing authority gets the same reduction.
- 4A:3-3.7APolice Assistant title: local service
A local title designed to run out. Police Assistant is a competitive division career service title with minimum requirements and a working test period like any other, and a permanent Police Assistant can only be removed through major disciplinary procedures. What makes it unusual is subsection (c), which lists six conditions requiring removal from the title for cause, and four of them are about not moving on: not meeting the promotional eligibility criteria by the announced closing date, not applying for the Police Officer examination while eligible, failing that examination, and not completing the Special Law Enforcement Officer Class 1 training the appointing authority provides. An unsatisfactory performance rating counts too, even after the working test period was passed. The appointing authority may transfer or otherwise move the employee to a different vacant title instead of removing them, but nobody meeting one of those conditions may stay a Police Assistant. One year of permanent service opens eligibility for the Police Officer promotional examination.
- 4A:3-3.7BCorrectional Police Officer Apprentice title: State service
During the apprenticeship there is no appeal to the Civil Service Commission at all. That exclusion is written to override anything else in Title 4A, and the only route of appeal is to the Police Training Commission. The appointment itself is temporary, made from a certification of Correctional Police Officer eligibles on an entry-level law enforcement list, and it exists so the appointee receives the training the Police Training Act requires. It runs no more than six months, the same length for everyone appointed from the same certification, as set by the Department of Corrections. Seniority for layoff purposes and vacation leave do not accrue during it. Someone who already held permanent status in another State title is treated as being on unpaid leave of absence from that position for the duration, and that earlier permanent service is aggregated back in for layoff seniority and for the vacation benefit once the regular appointment to Correctional Police Officer is made.
- 4A:3-3.8Intermittent titles
A furlough here is not a layoff, and saying so is the point of subsection (b)1. Intermittent titles cover career service work with unpredictable schedules that does not fit a regular year-round full-time or part-time assignment. When managerial needs mean an intermittent employee cannot be scheduled in the coming week, the appointing authority may furlough them, and none of the layoff notice obligations or layoff rights apply, though reasonable advance written notice is still owed. Furloughing goes in inverse seniority order within a designated work unit the Chairperson has approved, and recall runs in seniority order from that same unit. Anyone holding full-time primary State employment cannot serve in an intermittent title and is exempt from the recall provision. Records are auditable, and an audit finding the intermittent designation inappropriate converts the title to a regular career service title, with the incumbent moved to a provisional appointment subject to testing and certification. Local service needs the Chairperson approval of titles, prorated leave and rates first.
- 4A:3-3.9Position review request and appeal procedure
The rule for when the work outranks the title on the payroll. A position review request is a petition to review how a position is classified, or a complaint that the duties performed do not conform to the specification for the assigned title. It is open to career and unclassified service employees alike, and the two services route differently. In State service the petition climbs through the immediate supervisor and the program manager or division director, who each have 15 days to agree or disagree in writing and sign, then via the agency representative to a Commission representative. In local service an employee, union representative or appointing authority petitions the Commission representative directly, and a supervisor who has not signed within 15 working days cannot stall it: the petitioner may forward it noting the date it was presented. A decision letter is due within 180 days. Success need not mean a better title, because one of the three available determinations is that the position is correctly classified but out-of-title duties are being performed, in which case the order is to remove them. Appeal to the Commission runs 20 days from receipt, and arguments not made below are not considered.