As part of its ongoing efforts to increase transparency of preliminary findings with federal contractors, achieve consistency across regional and district offices, and encourage communication throughout the compliance evaluation process, the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) has issued Directive 2018-01 standardizing the use of Predetermination Notices (PDN). A PDN is a letter that OFCCP uses to inform federal contractors and subcontractors of the agency’s preliminary findings of employment discrimination. In recent years, OFCCP has typically reserved use of the PDN for systemic discrimination cases and permitted regional and district offices discretion in whether to issue the PDN prior to issuing a Notice of Violation (NOV). The intent of Directive 2018-01 is to provide a uniform protocol for OFCCP staff to follow across all of its regions for using PDNs in both individual and systemic discrimination cases.
OFCCP compliance officers and other responsible staff must now issue PDNs at the conclusion of compliance evaluations where contractors have not provided adequate explanations to proposed discrimination findings. The PDN, in the form of a letter from OFCCP to a contractor, provides the contractor 15 additional calendar days to rebut OFCCP’s proposed findings that sufficient evidence exists of discrimination. OFCCP also orders that any NOV not yet issued must be held and a PDN issued in its place to allow contractors an opportunity to respond to the agency’s preliminary findings.
For more information, contact Claiborne Guy at claiborne.guy@agc.org or 703-837-5382.