Pro-Union advisors and laws are becoming more prevalent under the new administration.

There has been a lot of activity occurring during the first few months of the Obama administration, including a significant amount of pro-union steps. Listed below are a few of the changes that have occurred as of late:

• Assigning Hilda Solis as the labor secretary for the Department of Labor.  Solis is a four-term member of Congress with a long history of support for unions. She has made it clear that she believes that unions are mandatory and has continuously pushed for more organizing powers for unions.

• Support of the EFCA. President Obama has made several statements stating that he would gladly sign the Employee Free Choice Act (or The Card Check bill) into law once the House and Senate get it on his desk. This bill will take away the secret balloting for unions and enforce a binding arbitration for contracts that can not be agreed upon with in 90 days.

• Signed several pro-labor executive orders, including one signed on February 6^th, which makes large-scale federal construction projects agree to use exclusively union labor. This results in a monetary windfall to unions due to the amount of federal construction projects rising exponentially due to the Stimulus Package. On April 21^st, two more executive orders were signed delaying the effective date of new union financial reporting rules published during the Bush Administration, and the other proposing discontinuing the reporting rule altogether.

• Most recently, Mary Beth Maxwell was brought on as a senior adviser to secretary Hilda Solis.  Maxwell is the founding executive director of American Rights at Work, which is a pro-union advocacy group that is backed by organized labor. (Solis was also a board member of American Rights at Work, prior to her confirmation to Labor Secretary)

Should I hire friends and family to work in my office?

This is a question we have been asked often form clients over these past few from employers that are thinking about helping out those who have been laid off. Some small business run great with a husband and wife team working together while others realize there relationship requires them to be apart a few hours a day. Many of us have also worked where the boss who has a niece or nephew working below them. Sometimes this works out fine other times you hear people complaining about that nephew going to Uncle Joe about what they heard in the shop that day.hr needs, hr

The big question I always tell my friends and clients that are considering hiring a friend is "Are you willing and able to fire that person". Can you fire your spouse? Can you fire your brothers child? These can be tough decisions to make and if you have to make them will you do it in a timely manner before it effects other employees?

Just a few thoughts about hiring. If you have other questions on hiring, firing, interviewing job applicants or other HR needs give us a call.

Federal contractors have been granted a small delay until E-Verify becomes required.

The United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) recently announced that the rule mandating the use of the E-Verify program for federal contractors has been delayed again.  Federal contractors are not required to use the E-Verify system until June 30, 2009, pushing back the date by six weeks. The rule requiring E-Verify for federal contractors was first published to go into effect on January 19, 2009. As published, any contractor performing a prime federal contract that will be performed 120 days or longer and has a value of $100,000 or more would be required to E-Verify all new-hires and any employee (new and current) that will be working on the contract. For more information go to the USCIS website at: http://www.uscis.gov/everify

See Also

• USCIS E-Verify Delay Notice
  Notice from USCIS regarding the delay in E-Verify requirments

More than expected: Jobless claims still on the rise

Workers are still continuing to file claims for unemployment. Many economists have said the claims should start decreasing but the claims rose more than expected last week topping 6.1 million.  With claims continuing to pile in its clear the weak job market is not going to recover anytime soon. Some economists are said to believe that a decline in the number of jobless claims will suggest the recession will be ending. But we have yet to see a decline. “The Labor Department said Thursday that initial claims for unemployment compensation rose to a seasonally adjusted 640,000 up from a revised 613,000 the previous week. That was slightly above analysts’ expectations of 635,000” (Washington, 2009 News). The International Monetary Fund estimated that the global economy would have its first economy drop in more than six decades with a 1.3% drop, and they predict the US economy will have a drop of 2.8%. “The Obama administration is counting on its $787 billion stimulus package, enacted in February, to “save or create” 3.5 million jobs” (Washington, 2009 News).

Source: Foxnews.com/politics/2009/04/23/new-jobless-claims-rise-unespected-millions/, 2009 23 April, Washington News.

State plans on raiding assets of Pinnacol Assurance and taking away their ability to operate as an independent company.

Senate bills SB09-281 and SB09-273 are being heard today with a third reading on Monday April 13. These bills are trying to remand Pinnacol Assurance back to a state agency so the reserve assets that Colorado businesses have been paying into can be raided to pay for 500 million dollars of deficit in the state budget.  Since Pinnacol has been operating as a private insurance company, workers’ compensation insurance premiums have been reduced and additional dividends paid out to those companies with good claim history. Pinnacol and all Colorado businesses need help fighting these bills. 

Marcia Benshoof, Chief Business Officer for Pinnacol Assurance, explains the effect of the legislation even further: 

• Pinnacol is not a state agency, and it receives no state funding. In fact, it is required to be self-sustaining and, therefore, does not expose the state to financial losses.

• Current law expressly prohibits any transfer of Pinnacol’s assets to the State General Fund.

• Pinnacol has a 5 year history of distributing dividends back to policyholders ($300 million), which will cease if these bills are passed.

• Pinnacol has reduced rates by 42%  ($212 million) over the last 4 years, which will cease if these bills are passed

• Pinnacol’s assets are not public funds! They are private funds set aside from premiums paid by Colorado businesses to ensure the safety and soundness of the company’s obligations to injured Colorado workers.

• This legislation is a shortsighted, ill-advised effort to fill a budget deficit. The ramifications are multi-faceted, including higher workers’ compensation costs, instability in the marketplace and uncertainty for injured workers and their families.

• Pinnacol Assurance provides workers’ compensation insurance to 58,000 Colorado businesses.

Help Colorado’s businesses and economy, please take action now, and contact your state representative.

Payroll position open

StaffScapes provides small and mid-sized businesses with an integrated suite of services including HR administration, safety and risk management, payroll and tax administration and employee benefits.  We are seeking a Payroll Administrator based in Westminster and serving clients along the Front Range. 

Responsibilities:

• Process employee enrollment, including personnel document verification, input and storage
• Interact with clients and employees to gather data, research and respond to payroll inquiries, and provide exceptional customer service
• Prepare accurate and timely payrolls, invoices and reports for our clients on a daily basis
• Work closely with the Payroll Manager to ensure accurate tax, garnishment and benefit administration
• Responsible for responding to and managing unemployment claims, including hearing representation
• Ensure legal compliance with federal, state, and local regulations related to payroll
• Create informative and educational articles on industry topics to publish on our blog and release to our clients
• Assist HR and Accounting with special projects and administrative tasks as needed.

• 1-2 years of office experience
• Strong verbal and written communication skills
• High level of organizational skills with ability to multitask
• Accuracy and attention to detail
• Must have excellent customer service skills and positive attitude
• Proficiency using Microsoft Office
• Ability to maintain a high level of confidentiality
• Knowledge of FLSA, state and federal wage & hour laws, Human Resource experience a plus

Pay Rate: $14.00 - $16.00/hour.

Please find the job posting to submit your resume with past pay history/salary requirements at www.jobing.com

See Also

• Jobing

I-9 Form, Employment Eligibility Verification, goes into effect today (April 3, 2009) for all U.S. employers

StaffScapes would like to remind everyone that the revised I-9 Form, Employment Eligibility Verification, goes into effect today (April 3, 2009) for all U.S. employers. Any other I-9 form will no longer be accepted at this time.

The revision date (Rev. 02/02/09) is printed on the lower right-hand corner of the form. As discussed in a prior article, the form was previously released and use in February but Obama’s 90 day wait period made the I-9 publication delayed until today.

The current I-9 form, was published on Dec.17, 2008 by the Federal Register, the forms changes include the list of documents acceptable for the Employment Eligibility Verification (Form I-9) process.  Employers may no longer use previous versions of the Form I-9 because they are expired. The revised column List A improves the security and effectiveness of the Form I-9 process. The List A specifies that expired documents are no longer acceptable forms of identification or employment authorization.

Retention of the Form I-9 is either three years after the date of hire or one year after employment is terminated, whichever is later.

For more information on employment documentation, retention or the Form I-9 contact StaffScapes Human Resource Department at 303-466-7864

People who are looking for work and are currently employed need to consider a few changes to better thier succes when looking for a new job.

We recently placed an add for a new payroll administrator on jobing.com over the week we have gotten in over 150 resumes for this job posting. During the review process we noticed a few items in the resume that may make it difficult for applicants to get recognized by prospective employers. 

Below are a few things to consider not having on your resume:

- If currently employed do not fax your resume from your office fax machine.

- This also goes if you plan to email your resume in don’t use you current employers email account.

- The phone number you use for a prospective employer should not be your current employers phone number. Many employers have caller ID and this can cause problems. You would not want to get fired for looking for work on company time.

-If you leave a phone number to call consider updating your voice mail message that an employer would feel comfortable leaving a message on. Don’t leave "bro leave a message I may call you back".

These are a few things to thing about changing or updating on your resume.

See Also

• Payroll Administrator
  Jobing.com payroll add

The IRS recently published information about the non-taxability of unemployment benefits.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (or Stimulus Bill) has given individuals that are collecting unemployment benefits in 2009, the ability to exclude the first $2,400 of these benefits. The exclusion applies to each individual separately even for married couples filing. This exclusion applies only to benefits received in 2009, so this will not reduce the taxable wages for the 2008 year form 1040 that most people are filing currently. Further information can be found posted at the IRS website at the following address: http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=205633,00.html.