Employer EEO-1 Reporting Deadline: 10 Things To Know

Written by Joanna Morrow

Joanna Morrow, Principal and Founder of Employer Benefits & Advice, is an employer consultant and advocate who has worked in the employee benefits industry for over two decades. She works diligently to help employers overcome obstacles in their business by sharing her expertise in Human Resources, Benefits & Compensation, Process Mapping, Risk Management and ERISA/DOL/IRS compliance. She is a licensed life and health insurance professional in the State of Arizona and is an active member of the National Association of Health Underwriters (NAHU).

Employer EEO-1 Reporting Deadline: 10 Things To Know

On March 18, 2019 the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) announced employers may now begin using the EEO-1 Online Filing System to report their 2018 employment data.The official opening followed a federal court decision, issued on March 4, 2019, that reinstated requirements for employers to also include information about employee pay and hours of work on the revised EEO-1 Reports.

Because the current 2018 EEO-1 does not accommodate this information, the court issued another ruling on March 19, 2019. Under this ruling, the EEOC must inform employers of its plan for collecting pay and work-hour data on the 2018 EEO-1 by April 3, 2019.

Below are answers to 10 of the most common questions relative to the EEOC, EEO-1 filing, the current controversy, and other important information for employers around the reporting requirements.

1. What do Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) laws govern?

Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) laws prohibit specific types of job discrimination in certain workplaces.

2. What Federal entities are responsible for overseeing EEO laws?

The Department of Labor has two agencies which deal with EEO monitoring and enforcement, the Civil Rights Center and the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs.

  1. Civil Rights Center, part of the Office of Assistant Secretary for Administration and Management, oversees EEO in programs and activities receiving federal financial assistance. CRC also assures equal opportunity for all applicants to and employees of DOL.
  2. The Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs oversees employers holding federal contracts and subcontracts.

3. What is the function of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC)?

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) is an independent federal agency that promotes equal opportunity in employment through administrative and judicial enforcement of the federal civil rights laws and through education and technical assistance. Applicants and employees of most private employers, state and local governments, educational institutions, employment agencies and labor organizations may be assisted by the EEOC.

4. What information do employers have to report to the EEOC?

Each year, certain employers are required to file an EEO-1 Report, a federally mandated survey that collects workforce data, categorized by race, ethnicity, sex and job category. The EEOC uses this information to enforce federal prohibitions against employment discrimination and discriminatory pay practices.

5. What is the deadline for Employers filing the EEO-1 report?

With some exceptions, employers must file EEO-1 Reports by March 31 every year.

However, the deadline for 2018 reports has been extended to May 31, 2019.

6. Why has the deadline for employers filing the 2018 EEO-1 report been extended?

On Sept. 29, 2016, the EEOC announced that it would begin requiring certain employers to add information about their employees’ wages and hours of work to their EEO-1 reports. This was to be reported using a revised EEO-1 form that labels the new wage and hours information requirements as EEO-1 “Component 2” data.

Due to concerns about the burden that the Component 2 requirements would place on employers, the federal Office of Management and Budget (OMB) blocked them in August 2017. As a result, employers did not have to include pay or hours-worked data on their 2017 EEO-1 reports (which were due July 1, 2018).

7. Do employers have to report Component 2 data on their 2018 EEO-1 report?

On March 4, 2019, the U.S. District Court for Washington, D.C., issued a decision that reinstated the EEO-1 Component 2 requirements. Two weeks later, however, the 2018 EEO-1 officially opened with no way for employers to enter the Component 2 data.

The court addressed this the next day, March 19, 2019, by ordering the EEOC to announce how it plans to collect the Component 2 data on the 2018 EEOC-1. The order set an April 3, 2019, deadline for the EEOC to comply. The EEOC also released a statement on March 19, 2019, indicating that it is “working diligently on next steps in the wake of the court’s order” and “will provide further information as soon as possible.”

8. What actions should be taken by employers subject to EEO-1 reporting?

Although the EEOC sends notification letters to employers it knows are subject to EEO-1 requirements, all employers are responsible for obtaining and submitting the necessary information by the appropriate deadline. Therefore, all employers should:

  • become familiar with EEO-1 requirements in general
  • begin preparing their 2018 EEO-1 reports
  • closely monitor the EEO-1 website for specific guidance on providing the Component 2 data for 2018

9. Which employers are subject to EEO-1 Reporting Requirements?

The following employer descriptions are subject to EEO-1 Reporting Requirements:

  • A private employer that has 100 or more employees (with limited exceptions for schools and other organizations);
  • A private employer with between 15 and 99 employees, if it is part of a group of employers that legally constitutes a single enterprise employing 100 or more employees; and
  • A federal contractor that has 50 or more employees and is either a prime contractor or first-tier subcontractor, and has a contract, subcontract or purchase order amounting to $50,000 or more.

10. What are the penalties for failing to file an EEO-1 report?

Any employer failing or refusing to file Report EEO-1 when required to do so may be compelled to file by order of a U.S. District Court, upon application of the EEOC.

Employers found guilty of making willfully false statement(s) on the EEO-1 are in violation of the United States Code, Title 18, section 1001, and punishable by fine or imprisonment.

For more information about your EEOC requirements, contact us at [email protected] or call 602-903-4047.