Most Important Documents for Your Employees to Sign

Before hiring a new employee, it’s important to get everything squared away on the legal side of things. Although this is a little bit boring, it protects both you and the employee to ensure everyone is on the same page.

If you’ve never hired an employee before, it can be a bit tedious to know what paperwork you should require them to fill out. In this article, we are going to give you a rundown of the most important paperwork you and your future employee should go over before the final hiring.

Getting Started

The first thing you should do whenever hiring an employee is to check local labor regulations near you. Every local ordinance has different laws pertaining to employees and businesses. Check your local regulations to ensure you do everything right by your local government.

Create An Employment Contract

Once you look through all of the local ordinances, you can start creating an employment contract for your future employee. This contract can either be handed in person, or you can email it to them with the job offer.

Your employment contract should hit on pertinent job information, such as the work schedule, employment length, compensation, benefits, responsibilities, and termination conditions. This document ensures that both you and the employee understand what their requirements are.

Give the employee a couple of days to go over the employment contract and any other information you want to give them. This gives them the opportunity to actually understand their role and turn it down or accept it depending on what they learn about the role.

Employment Forms Required By Law

After your employee reads through the contract and agrees they still want the job, it’s time to move on to the employment forms that are required by law. These forms offer to hire data so that you can classify and properly compensate all of your employees.

Most commonly, you will need to turn in a W-4 or W-9, and I-9 Employment Eligibility Verification Form, State Tax Withholding Form, Direct Deposit Form, and an E-Verify System. Depending on where you live, there may be additional forms to fill out, which is why you need to check with your local laws.

Prepare Internal Forms

Once you get to this stage, you have the most necessary paperwork out of the way, but you aren’t done yet. Now, you need to prepare internal forms. These forms establish your relationship with the employees.

This will include non-compete agreements, non-disclosure agreements, employee handbooks, drug and alcohol tests, and anything else that you need your employees to know for a proper working relationship in your business. Documents relating to employee benefits fall under this category too.

Because internal forms are not required for all businesses, you will need to find copies either online or by talking to a lawyer. You can easily find reputable and free document templates online to save you some money.

Gather The Employee’s Personal Information

Finally, the last sort of document you need to gather and fill out is related to your employee’s personal data in the case of emergencies. You should have your employee’s emergency contacts, a brief medical history, and a list of any food allergies.

These documents don’t need to be formal, but you need to store them somewhere in your office so that they are easy to find in a worst-case scenario.

Final Thoughts

As a business owner, it is your responsibility to prepare all the paperwork on the legal side of things. Even though it is boring and tedious, it is the only way to ensure that you and your employees are respected and treated fairly in a mutual relationship. Thanks to the Internet, it is easier than ever to create and gather the needed paperwork.

This is a Contributor Post. Opinions expressed here are opinions of the Contributor. Influencive does not endorse or review brands mentioned; does not and cannot investigate relationships with brands, products, and people mentioned and is up to the Contributor to disclose. Contributors, amongst other accounts and articles may be professional fee-based.