We hope you take a few minutes to breeze through this issue…we have some important information for managing your HR function and, most importantly, to enhance your bottom line.
May this month be fun and prosperous!
--Terri Olson & Maggie Hattan
Exceptional customer service builds relationships and brings in repeat business. Customers want to be treated special – not avoided or ignored – which can occur when employees are afraid of being asked a question they can’t understand or answer. This often happens if your employees’ native tongue is not English. Smiling or greeting customers is just not enough. Your company’s customer service suffers from this kind of “distant” employee contact and you may find your customers spending their money elsewhere.
In addition, employees who don’t speak English but are loyal, trustworthy and hardworking aspire for the same opportunities other employees want – promotions, raises and other benefits. Not having a command of the English language is one of the biggest barriers to these opportunities since they cannot speak English well enough to delegate, supervise or direct other employees. If they could just learn enough English that relates specifically to their jobs, your company could give them exciting opportunities that would also change the face of your organization.
Do these issues describe challenges at your business? HR Prescriptions has the answer!
What do you do with all those Internet applicants? Are you required to track their information on your Applicant Flow Log? HR Prescriptions offers help in knowing what to do:
Under the OFCCP’s rules for job applications submitted electronically, when individuals respond to a job posting through electronic technology, employers need to collect information regarding an applicant’s race, gender, and ethnicity only from those individuals who meet the definition of Internet applicant. An individual is considered an “Internet applicant” if all four of the following criteria are met:
Source: National Human Resources Association
Do you have an Applicant Flow Log? Give us a call.
Two new tax benefits are now available to employers hiring workers who were previously unemployed or only working part time. These provisions are part of the Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment (HIRE) Act enacted into law today.
Employers who hire unemployed workers this year (after Feb. 3, 2010 and before Jan. 1, 2011) may qualify for a 6.2% payroll tax incentive, in effect exempting them from their share of Social Security taxes on wages paid to these workers after March 18, 2010. This reduced tax withholding will have no effect on the employee’s future Social Security benefits, and employers would still need to withhold the employee’s 6.2-percent share of Social Security taxes, as well as income taxes. The employer and employee’s shares of Medicare taxes would also still apply to these wages.
In addition, for each worker retained for at least a year, businesses may claim an additional general business tax credit, up to $1,000 per worker, when they file their 2011 income tax returns.
“These tax breaks offer a much-needed boost to employers willing to expand their payrolls, and businesses and nonprofits should keep these benefits in mind as they plan for the year ahead,” said IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman.
The two tax benefits are especially helpful to employers who are adding positions to their payrolls. New hires filling existing positions also qualify but only if the workers they are replacing left voluntarily or for cause. Family members and other relatives do not qualify.
In addition, the new law requires that the employer get a statement from each eligible new hire certifying that he or she was unemployed during the 60 days before beginning work or, alternatively, worked fewer than a total of 40 hours for someone else during the 60-day period. The IRS is currently developing a form employees can use to make the required statement.
Businesses, agricultural employers, tax-exempt organizations and public colleges and universities all qualify to claim the payroll tax benefit for eligible newly-hired employees. Household employers cannot claim this new tax benefit.
Employers claim the payroll tax benefit on the federal employment tax return they file, usually quarterly, with the IRS. Eligible employers will be able to claim the new tax incentive on their revised employment tax form for the second quarter of 2010. Revised forms and further details on these two new tax provisions will be posted on IRS.gov during the next few weeks.
Source: IRS
Newly coined word for the workplace: “dining al desko”
Definition – Satisfying midday hunger at your desk because you don’t have time to take a proper break. Used in a sentence: “While dining al desko, Jennifer munched on a Panini sandwich in one hand while skillfully maneuvering her mouse with the other.”