Thanks to a recent court decision, employers will need to file their EEO-1 Form in two parts this year, one at the end of May and the other at the end of September.

The first part contains what is termed Component 1 data (workforce demographics by job category, race, ethnicity and gender), that employers were already expected to file by May 31. The EEO-1 Web portal is already open for filing this data.

The Component 1 data was intended to replace a much more complex and burdensome filing of data broken down by job functions and pay levels that had been adopted in 2016 during the Obama Administration and which was later blocked by the Trump administration.

Under the Obama-era requirement, employers are expected to supply W-2 form income data for their employees divided into 10 different job categories, then further categorize that compensation data into 12 different salary bands, ranging from about $19,000 to more than $208,000 a year. This is now called Component 2 data and EEOC says employers must file it by Sept. 30.

It was this portion of the data gathering that was reinstated by the federal district court judge in early March (AA, 3-15-19, P. 4), not long after the commission had set a deadline of May 31 for employers to submit their Component 1.

EEOC acknowledged the burden for employers of having to compile and file Component 2 pay data, along with its inability to collect and process such data as part of the 2018 EEO-1 reporting proceeding with the May 31 deadline. EEOC also says it would take nine months to modify its current processes to support collecting large amounts of sensitive Component 2 pay data from last year.

EEOC adds that it is not capable of collecting Component 2 data by Sept. 30, 2019 on its own and would need to retain a data and analytics contractor to undertake and close data collection. EEOC also estimates that to do this would generate more than $3 million in addional costs.