Colorado's New Law Requires Compensation Details in All Job Postings

The Colorado Department of Labor and Employment (CDLE) issued its final Equal Pay Transparency Rules (EPT Rules) which are new rules on job and promotional postings that went into effect January 1, 2021.

Effective Jan 1, 2021, Colorado Employers (defined as anyone with more at least 1 employee) must include the following compensation and benefits information in each posting:

• The hourly rate or salary compensation (or a range thereof) that the employer in good faith believes it may pay for the particular job,

• A general description of any bonuses, commission, or other forms of compensation that are being offered for the role, and

• A general description of the other benefits that are being offered for the role.

For employers that elect to include a range of potential compensation, the range may extend from the lowest to the highest pay “the employer in good faith believes it might pay for the particular job, depending on the circumstances.” Accordingly, the range can be tailored to the expectations for that particular opening and need not reflect the full potential range for that role in general. The range cannot, for example, include the range of compensation that employer pays to all of its variety of employees, it must be specific to that position. In addition, employers may “ultimately pay more or less than the posted range, if the posted range was the employer’s good-faith and reasonable estimate of the range of possible compensation at the time of the posting.”

This should change the field of Indeed and Monster.com postings and provide employees with some Insight as to the pay offered by positions they are seeking. However, it also takes a good deal of the flexibility away from employers who may wish to pivot their job searches but find themselves hamstrung by potential employee expectations based on posted compensation. For more information, see the full Equal Pay Transparency Rule here.