After a yearlong delay due to the pandemic, it's time for filing an EEO-1 Component 1 Report (EEO-1 Report) again. Last May, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) announced that it was delaying collecting EEO-1 reports until 2021 due to the impact of COVID-19. Data collection will open through the EEOC website on April 26, 2021, and the deadline to file is July 19, 2021.

As a reminder, three groups of qualifying employers are required to file an EEO-1Report:

  1. All private sector employers subject to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act with 100 or more employees;

  2. Federal government prime contractors or first-tier subcontractors with both 50 or more employees and contracts of $50,000 or more; or

  3. Companies serving as a depository of government funds or U.S. savings bonds or notes with 50 or more employees. 

Nonprofit organizations are not required to file a report. Qualifying employers have a legal obligation to file their EEO-1 Component Report.

If a company has a parent company that owns the majority share, shares an Employer ID Number, or is associated with another company through common ownership, the corporate headquarters of the parent company should file the EEO-1 Component 1 Report.

Because data was not collected last year, a qualifying employer must first file and certify the 2019 EEO-1 Report and then the 2020 EEO-1 Report by July 19. A company that was eligible for only one year must submit an EEO-1 Report for the year that it is required, and certify that it was ineligible for the other year.

To prepare to submit the EEO-1 Report, employers should collect the number of employees by race/ethnicity and sex within 10 job categories: executive/senior level officials; first/mid-level officials; professionals; technicians; sales workers; administrative support; craft workers, laborers and helpers; operatives; and service workers. The EEO-1 Component 1 Job Classification Guide identifies job titles that fall into each job category.

Companies that have experienced a merger, acquisition, or spinoff since filing the 2018 EEO-1 information should contact the EEOC support team to let them know about the entity change.

The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.