3 Employee Groups with Unique Labor Law Posting Requirements

labor law postings showing hr law compliance

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes

(Editor’s Note: Today’s article is brought to you by our friends at Poster Guard© Poster Compliance Service from HRdirect, the leading labor law poster service that gets your business up to date with all the required federal, state, and local labor law postings, and then keeps it that way – for an entire year. Enjoy the article!)

A couple of weeks ago, I shared with you an article highlighting how different industries have different labor law posting requirements. It’s very easy to dismiss warnings about labor law posters with “Oh, we have all the right ones.” or “There will be headlines everywhere when our posters need to be updated.” That’s simply not true. 

While I’m not saying that government agencies are out to catch organizations that aren’t in compliance, it’s important to realize that in today’s fast paced business world, there’s no guarantee that labor law posting updates are going to automatically move into the trending topics section of your favorite social media platform.

So today, I wanted to build on the conversation we had about the different industry requirements to talk about how labor law posters have some unique requirements for certain employee groups. 

Group #1: Postings for Job Applicants. Don’t Assume Labor Law Postings are Only for Employees.

We have a tendency to think of labor law postings as being just for our employees. Truth is, four of the six mandatory federal postings apply to applicants as well. There are also state and local requirements. Physical postings must be displayed for applicants that come into your work location for interviews, pre-employment testing, or any part of the hiring process. By law, applicants must be able to view these federal postings in your business:

And if your organization accepts online applications, there needs to be a way for applicants to view them there too. In an article on Yahoo Finance, 99% of Fortune 500 Companies are using applicant tracking systems (ATS), and 75% of recruiters are using an ATS to some extent. As organizations take more of their processes online, they need to be prepared to take their compliance online as well. 

Group #2: Spanish Language Postings. Don’t Assume Spanish Language Postings Only Apply When You Have Spanish Speaking Employees.

As of July 1, 2021, the U.S. Census reports that the Hispanic population of the United States was 62.6 million, making people of Hispanic origin the nation’s largest ethnic or racial minority. There are thirteen states with a population of more than one million Hispanic residents: AZ, CA, CO, FL, GA, IL, NJ, NM, NY, NC, PA, TX, and WA. 

Twenty-one (21) states and territories are required by law to have certain labor law postings in English and Spanish, regardless of the composition of the workforce. Additional laws apply if you have locations with a significant number of Spanish-speaking employees who are not proficient in English. Those locations must post certain federal labor law postings in both English and Spanish. Though not mandatory, it is in your best interest to display all of the state posters in English and Spanish in those locations as well.

Organizations cannot assume that, if they do not have Spanish-speaking employees, they don’t need Spanish language posters. Also, they cannot assume if they have bilingual employees that they don’t need Spanish language labor law postings. 

Group #3: Postings for Remote Workers. Don’t Assume that Labor Law Postings are Only for Onsite Work Environments

In an article on Forbes, they reported that 12.7% of full-time employees work remotely and 28.2% work in a hybrid model. We all know the reasons that working remotely is popular for both organizations and employees. 

On the organization size, it reduces the costs for commercial office space and decreases our carbon footprint. From the employee perspective, it reduces the cost of commuting and can offer greater work / life balance. In an article from the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), remote employees are more productive and save companies billions. While the SHRM article is a few years old, it does have some interesting statistics about the cost of allowing employees flexibility.  

Organizations with a remote workforce need to audit their processes to ensure everyone has access to labor law postings. There are U.S. Department of Labor (USDOL) opinion letters and court cases have determined that electronic notices are a reasonable alternative for remote employees. 

Close the Compliance Gap with Your Labor Law Postings

I’d like to think that organizations know they need to have labor law postings. But I can also see organizations forgetting to take the extra steps with applicants, Spanish language postings, and remote employees. 

But the good news is that organizations don’t have to spend hours researching this information. Our friends at Poster Guard have a Labor Law Poster Service that will do it for you. Yes, that’s correct. Poster Guard monitors labor law requirements (at the federal, state, and local level) and lets you know when things change. They also provide you with replacement posters every time there’s a change FREE of charge! And, they provide a 100% guarantee that the posters are in compliance or they’ll pay the fine. 

Oh, and one more thing about the service. It includes foreign language postings, if required for all employers, regardless of the languages spoken in the workplace. 

Honestly, this is a no brainer for me. As a HR professional, I have so many other things I need to spend my time on than researching labor law posting requirements. Personally, I would much rather have a professional service do what they do best, which frees up my time to recruit, engage, and retain the best employees.

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