OFCCP announced on July 1, 2016 that the Scheduling Letter and Itemized Listing has received OMB approval, and has been renewed through June 30, 2019 with a few minor changes. The new scheduling letter takes effect immediately, and will be used to initiate any supply and service compliance evaluations starting on July 1, 2016 or later. You can find the renewed Scheduling Letter and Itemized listing here.
OFCCP Institute (now The Institute for Workplace Equality) submitted comments in response to the proposed renewal when it was published on October 29, 2015. In our January 14, 2016 blog, we discussed two of these comments, which seem to have been taken into consideration before approval by OMB:
1. OFCCP should clarify its intentions and authority to share information amongst other agencies and the public
- The October 29, 2015 proposed changes included adding language stating that OFCCP “may share such information with other federal government agencies to promote interagency coordination.”
- The approved letter clarifies that OFCCP “may also share that information with other enforcement agencies within DOL, as well as other federal civil rights enforcement agencies with which we have information sharing agreements.”
2. OFCCP should remove the additional requirements included in the itemized listing to provide data every six months because it is not consistent with the requirements under Section 503 and VEVRAA to provide annual data
- The approved letter’s item 14 does say “If you are six months or more into your current AAP year on the date you receive this listing, please also submit current year hiring data to measure against your benchmark.”
- However, there is an FAQ on OFCCP’s website that clearly states that “Item 14 in the Itemized Listing, consistent with the regulation at 41 CFR 60- 300.45(b) (2), only requires that a contractor submit documentation of the hiring benchmark that it adopted… the contractor does not have to analyze or compare hiring of protected veterans to the adopted benchmark. ”
- It appears that the new scheduling letter requirement of providing current year hiring data for protected veterans seems to conflict with the OFCCP FAQ on this matter.
Finally, it appears that there may be a typo or clerical error in the published letter that OFCCP will likely make a technical correction to in the coming weeks. On Item 18, the letter indicates “if you are six months or more into your current AAP year when you receive this listing, provide the information in (a) through (c) below for at least the first six months of the current AAP year.” It does not reference item (d), which is terminations. Items (a) – (c) are applicants, hires, and promotions.
As always, we will provide more information as it becomes available. Stay tuned!
By Dave Sharrer, Consultant, and Joanna Colosimo, Senior Consultant at DCI Consulting Group
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