The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (“EEOC”) announced that it will collect information from applicable employers on employee pay and hours-worked—known as Component 2 data—for 2017 and 2018 as part of the annual EEO-1 report and the data is due by September 30, 2019. The Department of Justice filed a Notice of Appeal to challenge the collection of this data. However, as of now, the appeal does not put the filing deadline on hold. The EEOC’s notice advises employers to begin preparations for submitting Component 2 data. Link to Notice: https://www.eeoc.gov/employers/eeo1survey/index.cfm
In previous years, employers just had to submit Component 1 data—race/ethnicity, gender, and job category information. But the Obama administration added the new Component 2 requirement on hours worked and total pay for employers with at least 100 employees to help the EEOC and the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs identify pay disparities across industries and occupations. The purpose of collecting EEO-1 reports is to help the EEOC assess compliance with federal equal employment opportunity laws.
Before Component 2 went into effect, the Trump administration issued a stay, claiming the new requirements were too burdensome. In March 2019, a federal district judge hearing a lawsuit filed by the National Women’s Law Center ordered the stay lifted and set a May 31 deadline for submission of Component 1 data. In April, the judge ruled that the Component 2 data would be due September 30, 2019 and allowed the EEOC to decide which two years of data to collect—2018 and 2019 data, or 2018 and 2017 data
The EEOC announced it would collect 2017 data and 2018 data, and the deadline will be September 30, 2019. However, the EEOC won’t be prepared to accept submissions until mid-July. The EEOC expects that a helpdesk will be fully operational starting on approximately June 17, 2019. The contact information for the helpdesk is as follows:
Email: EEOCcompdata@norc.org
Toll Free: (877) 324-6214
Employers should act immediately to assess how they will collect this data for the EEOC to ensure they can meet the September 30, 2019 deadline. Payroll companies may be able to assist with this collection so employers should inquire as soon as possible.
