A jury summons in North Carolina starts with a name pulled from two lists: registered voters and licensed drivers. Each county’s Jury Commission draws from that combined pool at random, and the clerk mails a summons with instructions on when and where to report. Anyone at least 18, a resident of the county, and able to understand English can be called. Because service is mandatory, the only real decision most people face when a summons arrives is whether they qualify for an exemption or a short deferral. Common reasons for postponement include a scheduled surgery, travel booked before the summons arrived, or a documented conflict at work, and clerks will typically grant a short deferral if asked before the reporting date. Ignoring the summons outright is not an option; it can result in a contempt citation.
On the reporting date, jurors check in at the courthouse and are grouped into panels for whatever cases are set that day. Attorneys for both sides question the panel in a process called voir dire, asking about background, potential bias, and any connection to the parties or the type of case being tried. Some jurors are excused on the spot, either struck by a lawyer or granted a hardship request by the judge; the rest are seated and sworn in. From there the judge lays out the ground rules: pay attention, don’t discuss the case outside the jury room, and don’t research the parties or the law on your own. A trial can run an afternoon or stretch across two weeks, and there’s rarely a way to know in advance which one it will be.
For employees, the more pressing question is usually what happens at work while they’re gone. North Carolina law answers part of that directly. Under N.C. Gen. Stat. § 9-32, an employer cannot fire or demote an employee for being summoned or for serving as a juror. An employee disciplined for jury service has a civil claim for damages and reinstatement, and has a year to bring it under N.C. Gen. Stat. § 1-54. What the law does not require is pay. Unless a handbook or employment contract says otherwise, an employer has no obligation to pay wages for the days an employee spends at the courthouse. The state covers a modest per diem instead: $12 for the first day, $20 for each day after that, rising to $40 a day once service runs past five days. For most people, serving costs money more than it costs a job. A day’s wage traded for a $12 check is the real burden most employees feel.
For employers, the safest approach is a written jury duty policy in place before the issue comes up, rather than deciding case by case whether to pay or how to handle a long trial. For employees, the summons itself is rarely the problem; the friction shows up when a manager pushes back on the time off or treats the absence as an inconvenience to be dealt with later. That reaction is exactly what § 9-32 is written to prevent, and an employee who runs into it should document what was said and when. Jury service is one of the few civic obligations built directly into the employment relationship, and both sides tend to do better when they treat it that way from the start. If you have any questions regarding jury duty, please call us at (704) 457-1010 or visit our website: www.lordlindley.com.