Your state, your last day, your rate — and the verdict prints your owed-by date, the penalty in dollars, your vacation verdict, and one total-owed number. Free, and nothing leaves your browser.
In almost every state: no. Your final wages are yours on the statutory deadline whether or not the laptop came back, the keys came back, or you gave notice. The deadline in your state does not pause for an equipment dispute — run the checker and you will see your owed-by date with the statute attached. An employer who believes you owe them money has a remedy — ask you, or sue you. Holding the paycheck hostage is, in most states, simply a late paycheck, and late paychecks are what waiting-time penalties are for.
South Dakota's statute lets an employer hold the check until company property is returned — a real, written exception, and nearly the only one. A handful of states let employers deduct for property with your prior written authorization. And if the amount itself is genuinely disputed — hours, rates, commissions — many penalty statutes give the employer a good-faith-dispute defense on the penalty, never on the wages themselves. The wages are owed; the fight is over the number.
Put the demand in writing (in several states the letter is what starts the penalty clock), keep the proof you sent it, and know your claim window. The order matters: deadline first, demand second, claim third. The free checker computes all three dates and the dollars for your state.