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human Back To Human Resources podcast, the podcast, all about
the delicate balance between people I'm business and quite
literally reconnecting the tube, my name is Tracy Ruben and I've
spent nearly my entire professional career in a jar,
join me as I share stories, opinions and words of advice
with you each week. Hi everyone, welcome back to the
podcast. Thank you so much for being here
for another week. Don't forget to rate review,
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that is interested in what we do.
When we talk about here, please feel free to share the podcast
with that friend. This week, I am going to be
specifically talking about some of the legislative changes or
Um, you know, information that's could be really impactful to
your experience, your company, your employees.
And so I just kind of want to set the stage.
So first of all, a lot of my episodes recently have been
guest episodes. I'm so we haven't really talked
about some like impending legislation or changes that US
based employers will be confronted with.
So definitely want to cover that and secondly There is an episode
coming up. It is the episode at the end of
October and it is going to cover HR horror stories because
Halloween is at the end of October.
And when I had asked folks on who follow me on my Instagram,
what they thought would be a kind of, like, a fun way to
celebrate the 100th episode. Someone suggested that, I
collect HR nightmare stories, HR horror stories, and share them
on a podcast episode. So that is What I'm doing.
So October 25th, I think is that last Tuesday of October that
episode will be all about HR nightmare stories.
Now what I want to say is that if you want to submit your HR
Horror Story or nightmare Story, scary story, whatever you want
to call it. There's a link in the show notes
where you can submit your story and I've already received a ton
but I think that the more I receive the crazier and scarier,
they will be because there are Stories already that I'm like
very concerned about and you know, at the end of the day I
will share them on that episode and you know will learn will
laugh, will grow? We will be concerned all of the
above, right? But it'll be a great way for us
to kind of maybe commiserate a little bit but share some
perspective and hopefully for me to be able to kind of respond to
some of the stories too and you know maybe make sense of the
craziness So with that, let's jump right into this week's
episode. So the two things that I really
want to talk about are the I9 flexibility extension coming to
an end at the end of October and pay transparency.
So the I-9 piece is something coming.
Almost like dating back to April or May of twenty Twenty-One and
basically the Department of Homeland Security said, okay
we're going to Grant an extension On this, you know,
temporary exemption for people who are onboarding in a remote
environment when it comes to their I9 documentation.
So companies that are not typically remote needed to
figure out a way to be flexible with I9 requirements.
And just so, you know, I 9 is a requirement in the United States
are for us employers to verify employment eligibility.
And basically, Employees, new hires need to provide
documentation that shows and proves that they are eligible to
work in the United States. And this must be completed
between the employee and the employer within the first three
days of a new hires start date. So if someone starts on October
1st then they have the first the second and the third to complete
their I9 verification and because of covid companies had
to kind of flex and do these processes.
Remotely. And so the Department of
Homeland Security said, okay we're going to allow this to be
remote if someone is you know in a time and place where they're
not meeting in person on a regular basis and need
flexibility to prove their employment eligibility.
And basically, that exemption also applied to the employers
because employers were afforded this flexibility to basically do
the I-9 verification steps for moly, which in, you know, by law
are technically not allowed. Now, there are some nuances here
and I do want to read what is important to keep in mind for
when this flexibility M? So the flexibility again will
end on October 31st on Halloween and basically that means that
once the October 31st comes around November 1st going
forward, the interim exemptions and flexibilities are no longer
granted and Have to do the physical check of the I-9
verification process. So once this, once November
first comes along the government.
Then we'll now expect employers to verify identity and
employment authorization documents in person for
employees, on-boarded remotely. During the pandemic, which means
that companies will need to go back to anyone, that was hired,
let's say, between 2021 or even 2020.
And T22, depending on how many and when the hiring was
happening, if anyone hired remotely, this is really what is
applicable here. If a company hired, someone
remotely during the pandemic, they will need to physically
check and re-verify, the I-9 documentation, which is a lot of
work. And actually, there is no need
to wait. So if you have not been doing
this within your organization, you can start as soon as you
want, you do not have to wait for November first to re-verify.
And actually, the expectation is that the re-verification is
happening after the employee begins working on a regular and
consistent basis in person or three days after a covid-19,
emergency. And so, for whatever reason, if
a state still is in a national emergency with covid, then once
that policy were to end or that, that Status ends, then it's
required. But in most cases, I'm going to
go on a limb here and say that companies have probably not been
Rivera fying. So this is your reminder and
your note to go ahead and re-verify.
Anyone that was hired during covid.
So something that is really important to consider here is
that wine a company goes ahead and starts to re-verify the
documents in person it should not Based on specific groups
like non-citizens versus naturalized citizens.
Or, you know, anything like that.
It really should be based on when someone is working or the
state in which they're like. If you went state by state, for
example, like starting with California and then moving to
New York, like the groups have to be non-discriminatory When
approaching the re-verification because it could come off
discriminatory if you if a company First goes and says,
okay, I'm going to re-verify all non-citizens are going to
re-verify, all naturalized citizens, you have to be really
careful in the process and the procedure that you follow.
When you go ahead and complete the Rivera fication, one of the
nuances here, is really related to like fully remote companies
or companies that are like fully distributed.
And maybe there isn't like a business entity or a Intuitive
of the business in a location where the employee is working.
So, in some cases, employees, can go to a notary and have
their documents verified in order to then be able to confirm
that the documents are legitimate and meeting the
requirements of the I9. Also, in many instances, there
are different agents that a company can hire to kind of
stand or act as representatives of the company.
The pi'illos have this with e-verify, there are third-party
companies that do this, where they will kind of take on this
role and responsibility, for verifying the I-9 documentation.
And so, there are ways to make this process less burdensome,
but most companies, at least my experience are kind of taking on
this burden themselves and going back.
And having to re-verify I-9 documentation is a lot of work,
if it were me and I needed to go back and revisit RFI, I would
probably Outsource that and ask, you know, anyone that was hired
during the pandemic and is now expected to work in person.
I would probably have them all go to notaries or I would break
it down by state and knowing that the temporary extension has
been is ending on October 31st. I probably would have started
that already, but since there are there's a possibility that
many of you listening Ting have not necessarily known this.
I would say what you would want to do is like a few States each
day or a few States each week, depending on how many employees
you have. Again, if you have a ton of
employees, I would say, probably over a hundred or over 200 that
have been hired since needing to have this needing to take
advantage of this flexible extension, and exemption that
you might want to consider a third party supporting this
process or hiring. One temporarily to support with
this like an HR admin or, you know, an intern or someone who
has some experience because I9 is a federal requirement and you
have to be really, really clear on what the expectations are
because it is very serious and there are fines Associated.
If these are this process has not done correctly or
appropriately or accurately. So just keep that in mind, you
should certainly take a partner in your legal counsel.
I'm sure that There are some attorneys out there who will
say, let's not even use a peo. Let's not even use e-verify,
let's just have everyone go to a notary like there are some
attorneys that are going to be much more strict, it really
depends. But the law is pretty clear that
the requirement needs to be physically.
The documents have to be physically reviewed, unless
there's a third party agent kind of verifying these things.
So again, if you are not a US based employer, This might not
feel super pertinent. However if you are living
outside of the United States and potentially looking to work in
the United States, it is important to know that there is
this process because if you are a foreign employee or candidate,
there has to be some sort of work authorization, in order to
work for a u.s. employer and this is the case in most
countries. Anyway but I 9 is At least from
my perspective. One of the more strict
requirements that I've seen as far as, you know, proof of
Eligibility to work. So, with that, if you have any
questions about the I9 process, you can always reach out to me.
But I did include documents and links to other, you know,
sources of information so that you can do your own research.
And if there's anything that I've said, This episode in this
recording that doesn't age well, because something changes,
please know that this is just a moment in time and so you should
always and continuously do your own research to make sure that
you are up to date on the most recent and accurate information.
Because we know that legislation changes all the time and this
isn't even legislation. This is really like just Federal
requirements. So make sure that depending on
when you're listening to this episode, even if you're
listening on, October 31st there could have been something that
changed and you know this episode might not remain as
fresh as it is today. So that is my reminder to all of
you. The second important legislative
change is really kind of like something that has been
prevalent for a long time which is pay transparency.
We've I think I talked about this back in 2021 because there
have been states that have been much more active Requiring pay
transparency upfront before someone's hired.
And so I thought it would be a good opportunity to talk about
this now because New York recently updated their pay
transparency requirements so I'm actually going to go state by
state. Now again this is u.s. specific.
So if you don't live in the u.s. I know that it's not necessarily
super relevant for you. However I think it's really
important to be well-rounded and you never know when you start
working for us based Her or if you yourself moved to the US I
mean who knows, right. But the majority of listeners
are based in the u.s. there are significant percentages of
people outside of the US but this this episode is going to be
really super us Focus. So let's go state by state and
this article or information I should say will be available in
the show notes as well. So if you would like to, Kind of
go right to that link and follow along.
You certainly can do that as well, but this is something that
basically shows us state-by-state what the
requirements are. Hey, everyone, I wanted to take
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There are 20 states, that provide pay transparency laws
for equal pay. And Allow employees to discuss
their pay in the workplace. However, there is a focus on
salary, ranges being provided upfront, only 10 states have
this type of pay transparency law or are working to pass this
law. Now, the and this is something
that was published August 20, 22.
And I like it because it has every state listed the way that
I view pay transparency and really policies in general is
that I always try Try to take the most stringent or most
compliance heavy State and apply the same policy across the
board. So, in most cases, California is
the most stringent, right? Like we actually there, the
first state on our list for pay transparency laws, they do
require that the salary range is on all job postings and this
will be effective, January 1st, I believe 2023, but they also,
they passed. An Equal Pay Act back in 2016,
that provided a ton of benefits for employees, but one of those
benefits was that it prevented employers from asking about
candidates past salaries and it does also require employer's to
disclose salary ranges. Now, this is the example that I
want to use in my past with California, being the most
stringent, and most compliance focused overall compared to the
rest of the states. This Concept of not being able
to ask past salaries. This is something that I would
have applied to All State processes.
So, if you were interviewing someone in Connecticut, don't
ask their past salary, ask them what they're hoping to earn.
And this was actually something that New York is often right
behind California and in terms of like passing legislation.
So when this happened back in 2016, we had already applied it
across the board. And then by the time that New
York past, Their own law with this same requirement that you
can't ask past salaries. The the company was already used
to this modality because it was the method in which we
approached all hiring. So, that is my preference.
When it comes to things like this because it's much easier to
manage one policy than it is to manage, you know, 50 if each
state passed its own requirement.
So unless there's something really, really specific That you
can't apply everywhere and you would only apply to one state.
I could see why you would have multiple policies, but in
reality, it's much more manageable.
If you take the most stringent State and you follow their
policies across the board. Now obviously I'm not an
attorney, there are a ton of reasons why you should go to
your legal counsel, your attorneys to validate that what
you're doing is lawful and correct.
I am not giving you advice on what to do but rather sharing
what I have done in the past and how I typically like to roll out
policies that can be really difficult to manage.
Covid is a great example of this to back when I was still in
retail and I was managing covid at a store level especially and
a corporate level. We just took the most strict you
know protocols and applied it everywhere that way it was much
easier to manage so moving on. Corrado which this is something
that took effect in January of twenty, twenty one has an equal
pay for equal work tact and it's one of the most important
aspects of the law is that it requires employers to list the
pay range and benefits of any job opening.
So, this is something that's been required since January.
And this is whether you are working remotely or in person,
and, regardless of how many employees you have.
Now, some states, do have minimum, A head count in order
for this law to be required for a business.
So just make sure that you're digging in.
If you work in a specific state or have employees in specific
states, make sure your double checking to see what the the
headcount requirement is because you might be exempt from the
requirement. If you have too few employees
moving on. Connecticut, also in 2021
October of 2021 required employers to provide a salary
range. If the candidate requested it
now, here is a good example. In Colorado and California, it's
required that the salary ranges are posted in Connecticut.
It's if the candidate requests it, if I was operating, you know
where I needed to apply this law cross, the states, I would, then
if I, if I had employees in Colorado and Connecticut, I
would follow the Colorado rule because it's more strict.
And even if it's an oversharing for Connecticut, employees, your
at least meeting the requirements in Colorado and
it's easier to manage because As you're following again, the most
strict requirements and compliance requirements.
But again, just some just something that I have done in my
past, that's made it easier to manage these things.
Otherwise, you would need to if you have, you know, HR
contingence or HR Support in each state, then maybe it's
totally irrelevant and you can manage it state-by-state.
Maryland is another state that has an equal pay for equal work
act. That was passed in 2016.
It was recently updated in 2020 with a focus on patrons.
Aaron see the law requires employers to provide pay ranges
at the candidates request and prohibits employers for asking
about previous salary history. So you see we're like when
states start to take on or see the effectiveness of these laws
and legislative agendas in other states, they start to add them,
which is another benefit of kind of taking this the most strict
compliance requirement and applying it across the board.
But we can see here that there have been many updates dates
with pay transparency. And so, I think we can expect
that they will continue. Moving on for Nevada in October
of 20-21. They started requiring employers
to disclose a salary range after the first interview employees
are also entitled to salary, ranges for transfers and
promotions. However, the employee is
responsible for making the request and employers are not
required to disclose that automatically.
Now, this is interesting, because we're starting to see
more of this, in terms of pay transparency, internally Up in
other states. I think New York recently
updated their requirements to include internal changes and
jobs. So this will be really
interesting. Again, this is going to put a
huge. I don't want to say burden but
it is type. A type of burden on the HR
function because it's a lot to manage.
So, another thing that I would do personally is create salary
ranges, that have the minimum like if Let me let me go back.
If you operate in a state, that is a lower starting salary, like
let's say, Florida to New York, Florida has a lower cost of
living, so maybe your salaries start at a lower rate in
Florida, but New York has a higher cost of living.
So they start at a higher rate in New York, the salary range
that I would probably think of providing is the minimum in the
lowest cost of living State and the maximum in the highest cost
of living State because otherwise you have to manage
salary. Is by every state.
And if you're posting jobs, like remotely for example, where
someone can work anywhere, how do you manage that?
And I actually, I'm still trying to figure this out and I've been
asking like colleagues to see how they're doing it.
And it's really kind of like up in the air because each state
has its own requirements. But if you are a remote and you
don't have to operate in any specific State, how do you
manage it? So this again is where I kind of
take the Perspective of like following the most stringent
because otherwise like how do you manage that?
And this is like, I hope in sharing this.
It shows you that I am learning at the same time and rate that
you all are learning this. So as more information comes
out, I hope to be able to share more information as well, New
Jersey, and Jersey City. Specifically have some
ordinances here. So in Jersey City, which is a
city with in New Jersey, the Ordinance requires employers to
disclose a job. Salary range of benefits which
also applies to promotion or transfer opportunities.
This was only in place for Jersey City, and not the entire
state of New Jersey. Now, add another layer of
complexity here, right? Like Jersey City, actually, my
family is from Jersey City and Hoboken.
It's like all there anyway, that's an anecdote Jersey, City
is a locality or a city, so it's like, if you were to take Miami
having their own ordinance but not Sara Lee, applying it to all
of Florida. This is the same, you know, kind
of deal here. Jersey city has its own
regulation now. So, again, how do you manage as
an HR person? How do you manage local, state,
and potentially Federal requirements?
If they come out? So, again, you already know what
I'm going to say, finding the most stringent is probably going
to be these easiest thing to do, unless you have HR Support in
each state or even like a region to be able to manage these By
state rule the city and locality by locality requirements.
We're almost done at the end of the list here, New York, which
includes New York City. And Ithaca have recently
implemented pay transparency laws that affect employers, of
course, in both New York City and Ithaca employers must
disclose salary, ranges and benefits.
Before a candidate is hired similar to The Jersey City law.
These laws only apply to either New York City or if Agha, that
means, if a candidate doesn't have a job in either of these,
The city's, the law will not apply.
So New York City and Ithaca are parts of New York, not New York
state and its entirety. So this I'm sure we'll continue
to see more coming out of this because California, as a state
has rolled out pay transparency. And like I said, New York is
usually right behind them in Ohio, specifically in Toledo and
Cincinnati their pay Equity act. Ensures that workers in
Cincinnati and Toledo are entitled to pay transparency in
both. Is employers with more than 15
employees must provide a salary range upon candidates request
the catch. However, is that this law only
applies? If the candidate has been given
a conditional offer of employment.
So this is different in that the employee or the new hire has to
be offered a job contingent on their background, check passing.
And whatever else is a condition is part of the conditional offer
and then they get access to the salary range.
So, what I could foresee happening is that someone is
offered a conditional job, then request the salary range and
then seize the range could potentially be in the middle of
that range or below where they realize they could be.
And this could probably result in a lot of back and forth
between the new hire and their conditional offer.
So, I, if I'm a betting woman, I think that Ohio will end up
changing its law. So that it's not After the
conditional offer has been made because it's going to create
probably a ton of back-and-forth, but who knows?
We shall see Rhode Island passed.
An equal pay law in 2021, which will only go into effect,
starting 2023. The law will require employer's
to provide a salary range at a candidate's request and will
also apply this law to transfers and promotions.
So again, we're seeing a percentage of these states
applying this requirement to internal opportunities as well
as a External for Rhode Island. It's important to note that
employers will also be required to disclose a salary range if
compensation is discussed in any way, even if the candidate
doesn't directly request it. So what this tells me is that,
if at any point, the person, engaging in an interview with a
candidate says, what are you looking to earn boom, that
triggers a salary range, being needing to be provided, even if
the candidate doesn't request it and then finally Washington has
an equal. Opportunities act, which was
passed in 2019 and recently amended to include salary
ranges. According to the law, employers
must provide a salary range once they make an offer to a
candidate. So again, this is an offer based
trigger and I think that this will end up changing to because
that it could potentially be a lot of back and forth, but this
was also passed in 2019. So maybe it worked out.
I don't know. Employers must also provide
salary ranges for employees. Who request them for transfers
and promotions. So, this is only a fifth of the
states in the United States having pay transparency laws,
but I guarantee you that most, if not all states, will
eventually have these laws passed?
I'm sure that this will be a political discussion, and that
there will be a ton of polarizing opinions on pay
transparency laws and certain States depending on their
political swing. However, for you as an HR, I'm
professional. I think it's really important to
be super clear on what the law is and what is required.
And if you operate in multiple States, consider how you will
manage all of this. Most of these laws have already
gone into effect. However, they've been amended to
include salary ranges going forward.
So if you are not already compliant in any of these states
that I shared, you do have to kind of go back and figure out
what your requirements are if there's a head count minimum and
things like that. So I certainly hope that this
was helpful. I know it's a ton of information
again. I'm going I shared all of those
links in the show notes so I hope that you go to those
resources and take advantage and read.
And again this episode may not remain fresh if you listen after
its published. So I encourage you regardless of
when you were listening to this episode to do your own research,
make sure that you are Clear. Make sure that you're compliant,
speak with your legal Partners, your attorneys in house or out
of house counsel and make sure that you are compliant because
this episode we know legislation changes like it's probably
changing right now. I'm recording it this episode in
the late afternoon and it could have already changed.
So you know by the time this is published and then by the time
it's heard by you it could already be stale.
So I do hope this helps and maybe this link will continue to
live on and and hopefully these These resources will update but
there's no really no real way to know for sure.
So moral of the story, do your own research, make sure you have
attorneys that you partner with and always focus on being
compliant with the law. And then you have nothing to
worry about. And it is okay to be extra
generous with your benefits or extra strict with your
compliance requirements. So long as you are meeting
again, the highest threshold like California has the highest
threshold and expectation for Transparency, laws, and double
time, and all of those things. So whether you are more strict
and meeting those compliance standards that they have at that
higher threshold or more generous, and giving benefits
because you want to only have to apply one sweeping policy that
is okay, as long as you are meeting the minimum in each, you
know, facet of the the where you operate now, of course, if you
operate in other countries like Canada, Mexico, India, Ukraine,
wherever those countries all have their own requirements and
policies. So you won't be able to apply
that same reasoning across country, but you can in the
United States across apply, most of the time across state lines.
As long as again, you are being your meeting.
The highest threshold for compliance and the minimum
threshold for pay and things like that.
If there's anything that I can expand on, please feel free to
reach out to me. You can email me at podcast at
HR Tracy Dot. You can DM me on Instagram at
HR. Tracy, that's trec.
I can connect with me on LinkedIn, although I have not
been on there in a while, so I have to get to all those
messages. But other than that, I do hope
this helped and I appreciate you listening and I will see you
next week. Don't forget to submit your HR
nightmare stories, and I so appreciate you being here.
Thank you so much. See you next week.