Filing a Workplace Harassment Complaint in Virginia

Agency delay is not supposed to trap you. Va. Code Section 2.2-3907(H) requires the Office to issue the notice promptly on your written request once 180 days have passed since the complaint was filed, or once it determines it cannot complete the investigation within 180 days, and it goes on to say that if the Office fails to issue the notice you may commence a timely civil action as provided in Section 2.2-3908. Section 2.2-3908(A)(2) is a separate route to the same place, allowing suit where 180 days have passed since the complaint was filed with the Office or with a local human rights commission. Make the request in writing and keep proof of when you sent it.

Yes, and Virginia says so in the statute. Va. Code Section 2.2-3907(I) provides that the general district or circuit court having jurisdiction shall accept the EEOC Notice of Right to Sue as a notice of the right to file a civil action under subsection H. That does not slow the 90 day clock, which runs from your receipt of whichever notice you are relying on. Be aware of a separate limit in Section 2.2-3902: where a complaint alleges a practice that is unlawful only under a federal statute or regulation, the Office may investigate and attempt conciliation, but unresolved complaints are referred to the federal agency and the Office then has no further jurisdiction.

The published definition at Va. Code Section 2.2-3905(A) is a person employing five or more employees for each working day in each of 20 or more calendar weeks in the current or preceding calendar year, and any agent of that person, or a person employing one or more domestic workers. That is well below the 15 employees federal Title VII requires. The five employee figure is new: earlier in 2026 the same section carried a 15 employee threshold with a set of claim type exceptions, and 2026 Va. Acts c. 950 replaced that structure. If your employer has between five and fifteen employees and the conduct is not recent, ask a Virginia lawyer which version of the definition applies to your dates.

Household employment has its own branch with no size threshold at all. Va. Code Section 2.2-3905(A) makes a person employing one or more domestic workers an employer, and the definition of domestic worker in the same section is broad, covering companions, babysitters, cooks, maids, housekeepers, nannies, nurses, caretakers, handymen, gardeners, home health aides, personal care aides and family chauffeurs. There are three carve outs: child care provided by a family member, friend or neighbor in the child's home, licensed child day programs, and casual companionship service for people unable to care for themselves. A nanny or home health aide working for one household is therefore inside the Act where federal law would not reach the household at all.

Va. Code Section 2.2-3905(B)(1)(a) reaches race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, pregnancy, childbirth or related medical conditions including lactation, age, military status, disability, and ethnic or national origin. Several of those are defined more broadly than their federal equivalents in Section 2.2-3901: sexual orientation covers actual or perceived orientation, gender identity applies with or without regard to designated sex at birth, military status reaches dependents as well as members and veterans, race includes hair texture, hair type and protective hairstyles such as braids, locks and twists, and religion includes outward expression of faith such as religious dress, grooming practices and the carrying or display of religious items. For employment claims, age means 40 or older under Section 2.2-3905(A).

In practice yes, because Virginia did not write its own test. Chapter 39 of Title 2.2 contains no harassment clause and no definition of harassment or sexual harassment, so a claim runs through the compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment language of Va. Code Section 2.2-3905(B)(1)(a). Section 2.2-3902 then makes conduct that violates any Virginia or federal statute or regulation governing discrimination on the listed bases an unlawful discriminatory practice under the chapter, which brings federal hostile work environment doctrine in by reference. Some neighboring states have legislated away that threshold; Virginia has not.