OFCCP's New Internet Employee Applicant Rules Effective February 6, 2006
- Wendy Shelton, Labor & Employment Counsel, Watkins Ludlam Winter & Stennis, P.A.

The Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs requires most financial institutions with 50 or more employees to maintain gender, race, and ethnicity data on applicants considered for employment.  Effective February 6, 2006, with enforcement delayed for 90 days, new federal regulations impose a host of new obligations.  If employment applications are received through the Internet, you must comply with the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs' (OFCCP) new recordkeeping requirements for job applicants. The new regulations essentially define an Internet applicant as someone who a) expresses an interest, b) in accordance with the contractor's standard procedures is considered for employment in a particular position, c) possesses the basic qualifications, meaning those that are noncompetitive, objective, relevant and that are advertised or established, and  d) doesn't remove himself or herself from consideration. 

The new definition of applicant does allow contractors to limit the number of expressions of interest they must consider if they use data management techniques that don't depend on an assessment of qualifications, as long as those techniques are facially neutral and don't produce a disparate impact based on race, gender or ethnicity.  The new regulations require contractors to keep for two years records of all expressions of interest for a particular position and contain particular requirements for internal and external resume databases.  They also require contractors to solicit race, gender and ethnicity data from all applicants.  If you accept Internet applications and/or utilize an internal, searchable database, we suggest that you contact your labor and employment counsel for details.