OFCCP Announces New Revised Scheduling Letter and Itemized Listing
On September 30, 2014, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) approved the OFCCP’s revised scheduling letter and itemized listing. As a result, OFCCP is no longer using the previous versions of these documents to schedule compliance evaluations. The OFCCP states that it will not schedule supply and service compliance evaluations from October 1 through October 15, 2014, in order to give contractors the opportunity to review and become acquainted with the new letter and itemized listing. These documents incorporate several changes, including changes necessary to evaluate compliance with the new Section 503 and Vietnam Era Veterans’ Readjustment Assistance Act (“VEVRAA”) Final Rules.
Some of these changes include:
- A requirement that contractors submit information in electronic format, if that is how the contractor maintains the information. Under the prior scheduling letter, this was merely encouraged.
- A requirement that contractors submit information by gender and individual race/ethnicity (as opposed to the broad categories of “minorities” vs. “non-minorities”).
- A requirement that contractors submit compensation data at the employee-level, as opposed to annualized aggregate compensation information. The information must include job title, job group, and EEO-1 category. In addition, the OFCCP changed the definition of compensation to include consideration of hours worked, incentive pay, merit increases, locality pay, and overtime.
- A requirement to show the contractor’s evaluation of the effectiveness of outreach recruitment efforts that were intended to identify and recruit qualified individuals with disabilities and protected veterans.
- A requirement to provide the utilization analysis for individuals with disabilities and benchmark assessment for protected veterans.
- Documentation of all actions taken to comply with the audit and reporting systems requirements of Section 503 and VEVRAA.
- A requirement that unknown race or gender be included in the “Data on Employment Activity.”
- Evidence of compliance with other requirements under Section 503 and VEVRAA, such as copies of reasonable accommodation policies and documentation of any accommodation requests received and their resolution, if any.
Now more than ever, we encourage you to contact counsel immediately upon receipt of a scheduling letter from the OFCCP, as these new requirements may require substantial time to collect during the short 30-day window provided to submit information to the OFCCP. Better yet, by assuring that you are in compliance with the myriad of affirmative action requirements before an audit, you better position yourself for a smoother audit process.
The scheduling letter and itemized listing are available on reginfo.gov at http://www.reginfo.gov/public/do/PRAViewIC?ref_nbr=201104-1250-001&icID=13735.