Date Posted: 02/18/2021
Electronic posters for remote workers? The DOL says YES!
Making workplace posters available to remote workers can be a challenge. How can they see the posters hanging in the lunchroom when they’re working from home? The solution is online posting, according to the Department of Labor (DOL), as long as certain conditions are met.
When all employees work remotely, the DOL allows electronic posting alone to meet posting requirements if:
- All employees exclusively work remotely.
- Employees usually get information from the employer electronically.
- Employees have readily available access to electronic postings at all times
When a business has some employees who work remotely and some who work in an office:
- The DOL encourages employers to use electronic postings for remote workers.
- Hard-copy posters must be displayed in an employer’s physical locations, even when electronic postings are available.
To comply with electronic posting requirements for remote workers, employers need to make sure workers can easily access the posters. This means employers need to ensure that:
- Employees do not need to ask for permission to view a file or access a computer. The electronic posters need to be readily accessible.
- Employees have been told how to access posters electronically. Information may be included in an employee handbook, for example.
- Employees can easily determine which postings apply to them. They may be grouped as federal, state, and local posters, for example.
To meet these requirements, electronic posters can be placed on an internal or external website, shared network drive, or in a file system that is always accessible to employees.
To make them easily accessible, employers can consider offering a link on an intranet home page that appears when an employee logs in to the computer system.
Some employment law posters, such as the Employee Polygraph Protection Act (EPPA) and Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) postings, need to be visible to applicants as well as employees. When all hiring and work is done remotely, the DOL allows electronic posting to fulfill these requirements.
As with the postings for employees:
- Applicants must customarily receive information from the employer electronically.
- Applicants must have readily available access to the posters.
To meet these requirements, employers may want to provide a link to these posters on a job application portal or applicant tracking system.
Other posting laws
In addition to posters required by the DOL, employers must also display other required federal, state, and local posters.
Some of these laws recommend or require electronic posting. For example, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) states on the Equal Employment Opportunity is the Law website that when employees telecommute, the electronic posting may be required.
To make sure all required posters are available to remote workers, a posting website should include all applicable federal, state, and local posters.
Bottom line
To ensure compliance with all posting laws, employers with remote workers should make electronic postings available to remote employees and display hard-copy posters in.