Illinois Becomes Second State to Require Pay Data Submission

On March 23, 2021, Illinois governor, J.B. Pritzker, signed into law Senate Bill 1480, amending the Illinois Equal Pay Act of 2003. Under this new amendment, Illinois private employers are required to submit information, including pay data, to obtain an equal pay registration certificate from the Illinois Department of Labor. The first submission is due by March 23, 2024.  

Employers who file a federal EEO-1 report, and have at least 100 employees in Illinois, will be required to certify compliance under this new bill. Employers must seek certification within three years of the law’s effective date (March 23, 2023) and require employers to recertify every two years thereafter. Companies who fail to certify within the three-year period will be subject to civil penalties “totaling up to 1 percent of the employer’s gross profits.” 

To obtain the certificate, required employers must submit the following to the Illinois Department of Labor: 

• An equal pay compliance statement including; 
• Policy statements to comply with equal pay laws 
• Equitable compensation practices 
• The most recently filed EEO-1 consolidated report 
• A list of all US employees, during the prior year, inclusive of race/ethnicity, sex, and total wages. The bill indicates that total wages are defined by Section 2 of the Illinois Wage Payment and Collection Act paid to each employee during the past calendar year, rounded to the nearest hundred dollars. 
• Section 2 defines wages as “all compensation owed to an employee pursuant to the employment contract or agreed upon by all parties” 
• $150 filing fee

This follows the state’ expected trend to enact separate equal pay reporting following the halt of EEO-1 Component 2 reporting in 2019. Last year, California passed SB 973 requiring all California employers to report pay data categorized by race/ethnicity and sex. 

DCI will be staying on top of all new information regarding this senate bill and will post updates as they come in. 

By Tyler Wurtz, Associate Consultant