The Delaware Department of Labor Division of Industrial Affairs has updated two mandatory workplace postings: the Minimum Wage and Employment Discrimination. Both postings are mandatory-to-post for employers operating in the state of Delaware.
2019 Minimum Wage
On July 1, 2018, Delaware passed Senate Bill 170 that would raise the minimum wage from the current rate of $8.25 per hour to $8.75 per hour on October 1, 2018, and to $9.25 per hour on October 1, 2019. Shortly after Senate Bill 170 was passed, a second minimum wage bill was passed. Under House Bill 483, an employer would be allowed to pay 50 cents less than the minimum wage to:
- employees who are 18 years of age or older during the first 90 consecutive calendar days after they are initially employed by the employer, and
- employees who are under 18 years of age.
This new law also pushed back the effective date of Senate Bill 170 to January 1, 2019. So, when the Delaware Department of Labor Division of Industrial Affairs updated the Minimum Wage posting in September, it quickly revised the posting to reflect the January effective date.
2019 Employment Discrimination
On August 29, 2018, Delaware passed Senate Bill 360 to address sexual harassment in the workplace. Effective January 1, 2019, an employer with four or more employees may be liable for acts of sexual harassment when:
- a supervisor’s sexual harassment results in a negative employment action of an employee;
- the employer knew or should have known of the non-supervisory employee’s sexual harassment of an employee and failed to take appropriate corrective actions; and
- a negative employment action is taken against an employee in retaliation for the employee filing a discrimination charge, participating in an investigation of sexual harassment, or testifying in any proceeding or lawsuit about the sexual harassment of an employee.
The Delaware Employment Discrimination posting has been revised to provide more information on the protections related to sexual harassment. The posting also clarifies that covered employers must give notice to employees of their right to be free from harassment at work, via an information sheet starting July 1, 2019. The posting clarifies that employers with 50 or more employees must provide all employees with interactive training and education on the prevention of sexual harassment. The training must include:
- the illegality of sexual harassment;
- the definition of sexual harassment using examples;
- the legal remedies and complaint process available to the employee;
- direction on how to contact the Department of Labor; and
- the legal prohibition against retaliation.
CPC has updated the Delaware All-On-OneTM Labor Law Poster with the current versions of these postings. To order a copy, visit our website or call our Compliance Advisors at 1-888-815-7497.