In the early days, your business may be small enough to operate on your own. However, as your business grows, you may have to hire some help.
As an employer, you have obligations to the state and to your employees in addition to the other responsibilities involved in operating your business. If you have employees now or are thinking about hiring them, you should familiarize yourself with the following employer responsibilities.
- Required posters
Federal and state laws require employers to hang certain posters in their places of business so that employees can see them. These posters inform employees of their rights in great detail.
- Child support wage withholding
You may hire an employee who falls behind on paying child support. If this occurs, you may receive a Notice of Withholding from the Illinois Department of Health Care and Family Services. You must comply with the instructions given in this notice, which require you to withhold a portion of your employee’s earnings for purposes of paying child support.
- Anti-discrimination laws
As an employer, you must comply with applicable laws about not mistreating employees or making unfair employment decisions on the basis of qualities unrelated to job performance. Protected employee statuses under state and federal anti-discrimination laws include the following:
- Age
- Disability
- Sex/gender
- Race
- Religion
Failure to comply with anti-discrimination laws could mean disciplinary action by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the agency responsible for enforcing them.
- Insurance
If you have employees, even if they are only temporary workers, you must support them in the event of an accident that injures or kills them on the job. This means either carrying workers’ compensation insurance or becoming self-insured.
The Illinois Department of Employment Security requires you to make contributions to unemployment insurance under one of two conditions. Either you have paid $1,500 in total wages during one calendar quarter, or you have employed one or more workers for at least 20 calendar weeks.
