Following an EEO-1 filing reprieve in 2017, employers must be prepared to submit that required form in March 2018.

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission did not require employers file an EEO-1 report in 2017 because it earlier had expanded the reporting requirements to include voluminous and detailed information about possible pay discrimination against women, Blacks and other ethnic groups.

Last August, the Trump White House office responsible for reviewing regulations stayed the new form. As a result, the old form now will be due March 31. It also covers race/ethnicity and gender information, but not pay data or hours worked.

Required to file the form are private employers with 100 or more employees, excluding state and local governments. Federal contractors with 50 or more employees also must fill out the EEO-1 form.

Filers may file the same EEO-1 form that was used in 2016.

While the timing of the submission of the reports is different, employers looking for efficiencies can make use of a single “snapshot” of employee data as of the previous year’s Dec. 31st, but are not required to do so.

Employers also may file EEO-1 forms that include compensation data based on any payroll period in October, November or December 2017, according to the law firm of Jackson Lewis PC.

There is an added benefit for those contractors who use a calendar-year Affirmative Action program cycle. The Dec. 31, 2017 workforce snapshot also may be used the 2018 plans.

The Obama-Era form would have required employers to supply the EEOC with voluminous amounts of personnel data to analyze.

When it was originally proposed by the commission expansion of the form was intended for reviewing the data gathered to discover if pay discrimination is the result of general employer behavior, or was specifically evidence of inherent bias.