As I told you last month in this column, the federal minimum wage is increasing as of July 24, 2007. As an employer you will be required to pay your employees at least $5.85 per hour. One year from now, on July 24, 2008, the minimum wage will increase to $6.55 per hour and then on July 24, 2009 and thereafter, you will have to pay your employees at least $7.25 per hour.
One of the other requirements that goes along with this increase is the obligation of employers to post a notice of the new minimum wage on your employee bulletin board. As of July 3, that notice is available for free at https://www.dol.gov/compliance/topics/posters.htm.
No matter how small your workforce, you must post this notice on your employee bulletin board. If you are thinking, “What bulletin board?” it is clearly time to review your obligation as an employer to keep your employees informed of their employment rights.
Both federal and state laws require that you as a private employer let your employees know what their employment rights are by posting signs that explain those rights in understandable summaries and in an accessible location. Failure to post proper notices can cost penalties of around $100 per notice per bulletin board.
If you have a significant number of Spanish speakers in your workforce, you should post notices in English and Spanish.
You can obtain free copies of the required posters from the websites of each of the federal or state agencies that requires them. There are also commercial operators like that can provide all the posters you need for a fee. You should make sure however that you don’t buy and post notices that promise rights your employees don’t have (such as Family and Medical leave if you have less than 50 employees).
The posters that you must have on your bulletin board, depending on the size of your workforce, are as follows:
- Equal Employment Opportunity poster: You must post this if you have at least 15 names on your payroll. It provides the necessary notice language required under Title VII, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act. It is available from the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission or as part of the consolidated poster most commercial outlets sell.
- Family and Medical Leave Act notice: The federal Department of Labor requires that employers covered by the FMLA (those who employ 50 or more employees within 75 mile radius) post a notice that both applicants and employees can conspicuously see explaining FMLA rights.
- Occupational Health and Safety notice: Every employer has to post this notice about employee safety. It is available from the Occupational Health and Safety Administration.
- Minimum wage poster: Every employer must put up this new notice that tells employees what the minimum wage is. It is available from the Wage and Hour division of the federal Department of Labor. Make sure you download the revised poster (dated July 3, 2007) showing the new minimum wage rates.
- Polygraph Protection Act poster: Almost all private employers, except certain security firms and those producing controlled substances, are prohibited from prescreening job applicants with polygraphs (lie-detector tests). The Wage and Hour division of the Department of Labor furnishes this notice about an employee’s rights to refuse to take a polygraph test except in ongoing investigations.
- Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA): This poster explains the rights of each armed services member when employed by a private employer, both while the soldier is serving and when he or she returns to civilian employment. Every employer, whether the company employs service members or not, has to post this notice.
- Texas Payday law and Texas Unemployment Compensation Act poster: The Texas Workforce Commission provides this consolidated poster that is required to be posted by every Texas employer. It explains the actual paydays adopted by the employer and the employee’s rights to collect unemployment pay if the employee’s job is terminated without the employee committing misconduct.
- Worker’s Compensation notices: Every private Texas employer, whether insured by worker’s compensation insurance, self-insured, or non-subscribing, must notify employees about whether they are covered by worker’s compensation insurance in all languages common to that workplace. The employer must also notify employees how to report workplace safety violations. A poster for each situation is available through the Texas Department of Insurance or your worker’s compensation insurance carrier.