According to the DOL, attendance at lectures, meetings, training programs, and similar activities do not need to be counted as working time if four criteria are met:
- Attendance is outside normal hours.
- Attendance is voluntary.
- The event is not job-related.
- No other work is concurrently performed.
Orientation can be considered a lecture, meeting and training program. Because new-hire orientation is generally held during business hours, is mandatory, is related to the job, and because some work may be performed, employers must pay for this time.
If an individual completes new hire paperwork before their first day, this time is paid time. While occurring outside normal working hours, these activities are not voluntary, are directly related to the employee’s job, and are productive for the employer. An employer cannot get around compensating new hires for time spent on onboarding activities by having them complete it away from its place of business.
If you encourage a new hire to review the company website and provide company information for them to look at, this is generally not compensable. This can be outside scheduled work hours and away from the place of business as long as it is in fact voluntary. Even if strongly encouraged, it is voluntary as long as the employer doesn’t do anything to make the worker believe that continued employment depends on reading the material, learning about the company does not directly relate to learning how to complete their job tasks, and the reading does not produce anything productive for the employer.
Sometimes an employer can be “ghosted” by an individual who doesn’t come back after new hire orientation, or by someone who has completed required new hire paperwork but didn’t show up for their first day of work. The individual would still need to be paid for this time as hours worked. Employers should generally enter the individual in the payroll system with information provided in either the new hire paperwork or the employment application.
If the individual did not complete tax forms, withhold taxes as if the individual had claimed no exemptions and forward the paycheck to the last known address, usually noted on the employment application or resume.