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A 3881

Regulates and requires issuance of raincheck by retailer where advertised merchandise is not available for sale

2025 Regular Session Introduced by George Alvarez and 2 co-sponsors

Requires NJ State Police to provide a free online portal for individuals with expungement orders to check status and publish annual processing metrics.

REFERRED TO CONSUMER AFFAIRS AND PROTECTION
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Bill Summary · A 3881

Note on bill identity: The provided bill documents for A3881 address criminal-history expungements and the State Police’s handling of expungement processing — not retail “rainchecks.” The summary below reflects the text and legislative history in the supplied documents.

Summary — Assembly Bill A3881 (P.L.2025, c.38)

Main purpose

A3881 directs the New Jersey State Police to provide public transparency and reporting on the processing status of court-issued expungement orders. The enacted law requires an online portal for petitioners to check the status of their expungement processing and mandates an annual public report on expungement volumes and processing timeframes.

Key provisions (final enacted text)

  • Online portal (C.2C:52-15.1)
    • The Division of State Police must establish and maintain, free of charge, an Internet portal that allows a person who has been granted an order of expungement to ascertain the status of the electronic processing of that order by the State Bureau of Identification (SBI).
  • Annual reporting
    • The Division must submit an annual report to the Governor and Legislature (pursuant to C.52:14-19.1) that summarizes:
    • Number of expungement orders received year‑to‑date (starting January 1), by expungement type;
    • Number of expungement orders received each month, by expungement type;
    • Number of expungement orders processed year‑to‑date; and
    • Relevant processing timeframes.
    • The report must be based on the calendar year and published on the Division of State Police website.
  • Effective date
    • The act takes effect immediately upon enactment.

Who is affected

  • Primary: Individuals who have been granted a judicial order of expungement — they gain a free online tool to monitor when the SBI finishes processing their expungement.
  • Secondary: Policymakers and the public — they gain access to aggregated data and processing metrics; this increases transparency and oversight of SBI operations.
  • Indirectly affected: Employers, licensing boards, landlords, and others who rely on criminal‑history background checks may benefit from improved processing transparency, but the final law does not itself change the rules governing dissemination of background-check responses.

Legislative evolution and key procedural actions

  • Introduced in the Assembly: Feb 27, 2024.
  • Committee amendments (May & Oct 2024) and further revisions created versions that would have required the SBI, on receiving a background-check request, to check for unprocessed expungement orders and omit any expunged records (and not reference expungement orders). Those provisions were intended to prevent disclosure of records covered by unprocessed expungements.
  • Governor Murphy issued a conditional veto (Mar 17, 2025) recommending narrower statutory requirements: instead of requiring SBI to modify each background-check response (which the Governor said would disrupt processing), codify an online portal and annual reporting to ensure transparency and continued accountability.
  • Final legislative action: Legislature received and concurred with the Governor’s recommendations; A3881 was approved and enacted as P.L.2025, c.38 on March 31, 2025. It is effective immediately.

Relationship to other legislation

  • Companion: S2513 (and related prior-session bills listed in the record).
  • Early versions sought operational changes to background-check dissemination; the enacted law focuses on status transparency and reporting rather than altering dissemination procedures.

Practical impact

A3881 does not itself require SBI to redact or withhold criminal-history information from background responses while expungement orders await processing. Instead, it creates a mechanism for affected individuals to monitor processing status and requires published metrics to promote accountability and oversight of SBI expungement processing.

Compiled from official sources — confirm details with the bill’s official record.

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