How long do I have to file an age discrimination claim?

Who is protected? In all five states, workers 40 and older

Every one of these laws draws the line at 40. The federal ADEA protects "applicants and employees who are 40 years of age or older." California defines age as "the chronological age of any individual who has reached a 40th birthday." Texas says its age provisions "apply only to discrimination against an individual 40 years of age or older." Washington reaches an employer who acts "because an individual is forty years of age or older." Nevada takes the same line from the other direction: it is not an unlawful practice to act on age "if the person is less than 40 years of age." Colorado draws the line in the same place: the Colorado Anti-Discrimination Act protects workers 40 and older, and unlike the federal ADEA's 20-employee minimum, it covers Colorado employers of all sizes.

If you are under 40, being passed over for someone older is not an age claim under these statutes. That is worth knowing before you spend a filing window on it.

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The federal 300-day extension has an age-only condition

For most grounds, the EEOC window stretches from 180 to 300 days when a state or local agency enforces a law banning the same kind of discrimination. Age is the exception. The EEOC says the age filing deadline is "only extended to 300 days if there is a state law prohibiting age discrimination in employment and a state agency or authority enforcing that law," and that the deadline is "not extended if only a local law prohibits age discrimination."

California, Texas, Washington and Nevada each have a state age-discrimination statute and a state agency that enforces it, so 300 days is available in all four. Do not carry that assumption to a city ordinance somewhere else. For age, a municipal ordinance and a city commission do not buy you the extra 120 days.

One more federal-only quirk matters here. The ADEA covers private employers with 20 or more employees, while Title VII and the ADA start at 15. A worker at a 17-person company can have a state age claim and no federal one at all, which makes the state deadline the only one that matters.

Warning for federal workers: one group is not on this calendar at all. The EEOC's own note says federal employees and job applicants have a different complaint process and generally must contact an agency EEO Counselor within 45 days, and that the limit can be extended in certain circumstances. If you work for a federal agency or applied to one, the numbers above are not yours. Age claims also come with a second federal route that skips counseling entirely, described further down. Ask your agency's EEO office for the counselor contact today, and get advice the same week.

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The five state windows, and where they diverge

California is the longest. A FEHA complaint has to be filed with the Civil Rights Department within three years of the unlawful practice, and the agency tells workers to submit an intake form "within three years of the date you were last harmed."

Texas is the shortest and the least forgiving. A complaint must be filed "not later than the 180th day after the date the alleged unlawful employment practice occurred," and the statute goes on to say the commission "shall dismiss an untimely complaint." Texas does have a 300-day window, but the statute limits it to sexual harassment. It does nothing for an age claim.

Washington sets six months to file with the Human Rights Commission, and the six months is harder to satisfy than it sounds. What you submit through the online portal is an intake questionnaire. Commission staff then draft a perfected charge that you have to review and sign, and the commission says all of that has to happen inside the six-month limitations period to protect your filing rights. It also reports an eight-to-ten-week backlog before a new complaint reaches an intake investigator. Submitting a questionnaire in month five is not the same as having filed. Washington separately lets an injured worker sue directly in court without going to the agency first, which is a genuinely different route rather than a longer version of the same one.

Nevada allows 300 days to file an employment complaint with the Equal Rights Commission, and its statute adds that a complaint "is timely if it is filed with an appropriate federal agency within that period."

Colorado allows 300 days to file with the Colorado Civil Rights Division, a window a 2022 law (HB22-1367) extended from six months, so older six-month guidance is out of date. CADA generally requires finishing the CCRD process before a lawsuit, and after a right-to-sue notice a civil action generally must be filed within 90 days.

Sources [9] · [10] · [3] · [11] · [12] · [13] · [14] · [15] · [16]

Age cases have their own rule about going to court

Under most federal employment laws you wait for a Notice of Right to Sue. Age is different. The EEOC says that under the ADEA you "don't need a Notice of Right to Sue to file a lawsuit in court," and you can sue "any time after 60 days have passed from the day you filed your charge," but no later than 90 days after notice that the investigation has concluded.

Federal employees have a second age-only route, and it is easy to miss. The EEOC's federal sector procedures state that under the ADEA an individual may go directly to federal court after giving the EEOC notice of intent to sue, instead of running the agency EEO complaint process. The ADEA sets the timing for that notice. The notice must be filed within 180 days after the alleged unlawful practice occurred, and the suit cannot start until at least 30 days after the notice goes in. Read those two numbers correctly. The 180 days is the deadline to GIVE NOTICE, not a deadline to sue, and the 30 days is a minimum waiting period, not a second deadline. Nothing here says the lawsuit itself must be filed by day 210. Someone who initiates the agency process instead keeps the ordinary civil-action windows. Pick a lane with advice, because the counseling deadline is 45 days and the notice deadline is 180.

The state court clocks are not the same as the federal one. In California you have one year from the date of the right-to-sue notice. In Texas you have 60 days after receiving the notice of right to file a civil action, and no state suit may be brought later than two years after the complaint was filed. In Nevada you have 90 days from receipt of the right-to-sue notice. Washington's direct-suit route does not require a notice at all.

Sources [17] · [18] · [19] · [3] · [6]

If a layoff came with a severance packet, read the dates

Age cases and severance paperwork travel together, because older workers are often the ones handed an agreement on the way out. Federal law sets minimum timing for any waiver of age claims. The EEOC says a valid waiver must give the employee at least 21 days to consider the offer, or 45 days in a group layoff program, and must give seven days to revoke a signature. That seven-day revocation period cannot be shortened by agreement.

A signature does not close the door to the agency. The EEOC's guidance states that no agreement between you and your employer "can limit your right to testify, assist, or participate in an investigation, hearing, or proceeding conducted by the EEOC," and that any such provision is invalid and unenforceable.

The filing clocks above keep running while you think it over. Twenty-one days of a 180-day Texas window is a meaningful fraction of it.

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