Onboarding integrates your new employee into your company, giving him or her the first look at their position, responsibilities and the ins and outs of how your company works. It is also your first chance to ensure compliance.

A good onboarding process should illustrate company culture, layout job responsibilities, introduce the new hire to the team, but it should also allow HR managers to fill out legally-required paperwork, get employees to sign off on company policies and complete required training to help be compliant from day one. And a truly great onboarding program would have it all automated, mobile and seamless.

3 Ways to Ensure Compliance When Onboarding New Employees

1. Begin with Required Paperwork

Your new employee must complete what seams like a mountain of required paperwork before the job even begins, per state and federal labor laws. According to SHRM, these forms help properly classify and compensate employees and commonly include:

  • W-4 or W-9 for contractors
  • I-9 Employee Eligibility Verification form
  • State Tax Witholding form
  • Direct Deposit form
  • E-Verify system that verifies employee eligibility in the United States

To make sure all these forms are completed, choose an onboarding system that allows your employees to fill out all this necessary paperwork at home before they start. Your system should also make it easy to have these forms on-hand for tax purposes.

2. Make Sure Your Hire Signs Off on Company Policies

Not only do compliance procedures protect your employees, but they protect your company too. Your company likely has specific policies about conduct, PTO, diversity and grounds for dismissal that you need new employees to read and sign to eliminate any potential liabilities or lawsuits. An onboarding program should not only make it easy for that information to be uploaded and shared with your employees but also allow them to be digitally signed. Digital signatures are then captured and saved with a time-stamped record within the program. Plus, once signed with a digital signature, all of the necessary state/federal compliance forms can be shared with the appropriate department. This onboarding feature is ideal for remote employees too.

3. Check Off Required Training

Depending on where you are located in the country, a certain amount of training is required for new employees. For example, some states require sexual harassment training for all new employees and others require specialized training for certain occupations. For example, in Alabama school truant officers may carry a firearm but only if they pass an annual re-qualification and in Texas, child care facilities must complete clock hours of training. Since laws are state-specific, SHRM recommends consulting with legal counsel to ensure proper compliance. Once you understand which training will make you compliant, they can be uploaded into an onboarding system for your new hire to complete, ensuring you’ve done your due diligence.

Arcoro Onboarding Software has a custom portal that helps employees get started on their new job quickly and maintain compliance with the ability to upload and sign all necessary forms, policies and handbooks. We’re also partners with myHRcounsel which provides companies with legal issues on both the federal and state level, a must for staying ahead of changing labor laws. Schedule a demo to see how our onboarding software can help your company stay compliant.