Restoration of personnel records

PUBLICATIONS \ 13.08.2020

Maintenance of personnel document management should be carried out by all companies that strive to build their business competently, knowingly avoiding problems and material consequences resulting from them. There is a common case when the settlement of this issue is shelved a motion by management, and the process is noticeably “sagging”: accounting is conducted without compliance with rules and standards, or HR record management is handled by employees who do not have special knowledge and skills. 

But for every company, there comes a moment of interaction with national supervisory authority.  In terms of personnel document management, this is primarily the labour inspectorate. A visit of an employee of State Labour Inspectorate may take two forms: scheduled and unscheduled checks. And if in the first option the company has time to prepare, in case of improper maintaining of records, you will hardly be able to avoid punitive sanctions during an unscheduled inspection. If violations of maintaining of human resources documentation are detected, administrative fines of 1,000 – 5,000 rubles may be imposed on managers, of 1,000 – 5,000 rubles – on individual entrepreneurs, of 30,000 – 50,000 rubles – on a legal entity (article 5.27 of the Administrative Code of the Russian Federation). If violations regarding foreign employees are found, or the fact of underpayment of salary and other payments was detected, in each case, the punitive sanctions are individual.

Restoring personnel records will help you prevent liability for damages and build the company’s personnel structure in accordance with the necessary legislative requirements. Further, we will tell you what restoring stages are necessary to be passed.

Stage 1. Conducting a HR audit

First of all, it is necessary to analyse the documents available to the personnel department. This applies to both internal regulatory documents and mandatory documents, as well as a set of documents for each employee. For further convenience, when restoring, all information on employees may be aligned in a unified register, which will show the correlation of available documents to those that need to be restored.

Stage 2. The restoration of the mandatory human resources documents

There is a list of human resources documents the availability of which in the organization is required by legislation. Paradoxically, it is this part of the company’s documentation that is usually drawn up most formally and negligently. But it is checked by labour inspectors carefully.

The mandatory human resources documents include:

This list of documents is used during inspections and labour disputes, as well as when applying to the court. Close attention should be paid to restoring this block of documents.

Let us clarify some details on the above-mentioned documents:

• Hiring of employees in a company without concluding an employment contract is a common phenomenon in non-systemic maintaining of document management. An employment contract should be drawn up in accordance with the statutory provisions of employment legislation in two originals, one of which an employee should have. Also, it is necessary to draw up supplementary agreements on changes in personnel for the employee’s employment period. The settlement of employment relationships should begin with drawing up a written notice to the employee about the mandatory issuance of an employment contract. After making changes, be sure to check the order for employment of an employee – it should contain information from the employment contract.
• There is also often a discrepancy between responsibility statements and the actual list of functions performed by the employee. It is necessary to carefully compare the document with the reality and, in case of discrepancies, make adjustments.
• The employee’s personal record form (T-2) should contain all the necessary information: personal data, employment, leaves, passing of formal evaluation, transfer and dismissal. All employees’ personal record forms should be drawn up in paper form and employees should be notified.
• Control of the availability of an employment book for each employee of the organization and entries in it (employment, transfer) is a mandatory procedure. If the check detects the fact that the current employee does not have an employment book, or the employee has one, this will be deemed as a violation. Apart from the employment books themselves, it is mandatory to repeat the control procedure with the book of record of the flow of employment books. And don’t forget to issue an order to assign obligations to an officer working with employment books.
• Regulations on training and formal evaluation of employees, as well as responsibility statements for each position in accordance with the staffing table, standard operating procedures for professions are not mandatory, if information from these documents is stipulated in the employment contract.

When restoring personnel records, there may be difficulties associated with dismissed employees. As a rule, such documents are archived in their unmodified form. The best option is to draw up a certificate on the transfer of cases or to issue an order for restoring HR record management. By doing this, you will be absolved of the responsibility for violations of your predecessors.

Stage 3. Familiarization of employees

After creating missing documents or changing existing ones, it is necessary to notify the organization’s employees about the updating in the personnel system. To ensure that the company’s employees are fully familiar with the documents, it is possible to issue a corresponding order for the company on conducting a HR audit.

Restoration of personnel records is a labour-intensive process that requires a systematic approach and deep knowledge of HR record management and employment legislation, which will help to find a solution for the most challenging cases. Acsour’s specialists are ready to undertake the entire restoration process, or get involved at a certain stage. Our experts, owing to their experience and constant professional development, will not only build the entire personnel system of your organization from scratch, in accordance with the rules and standards, but also help you to make sense of the updated processes for further effective maintenance of documentation.