LCPcertified IDOL Guide

Purpose & Important Notes

Beginning in September 2020, weekly certified payroll reports are required to be filed online with the Illinois Department of Labor, or IDOL, by the 15th of each month for all state-funded public works projects. Please note that this does not include projects that are strictly Federally funded.

The following training document will describe information regarding account set up and functionality of using LCPcertified to generate the CSV file that can then be uploaded directly to IDOL’s submittal portal called ‘Certified Transcript of Payroll Portal’.

This guide will explain the following items:

• How to find instructions and resource information on the IDOL website.
• Contractor information, including how to properly set up payroll data, employee profiles and your own company information to meet the IDOL requirements.
• Understanding the certified payroll data on the CSV file exported from LCPcertified.

Note:

There is information required by IDOL that historically has not been collected in LCPtracker. By following this guide and making sure the information that is collected within LCPtracker is  entered, Contractors will be able to meet the minimum required fields by IDOL to be able to upload their payroll file.

However, Contractors may need to provide any additional information to IDOL. This can be done by filling out  the export file prior to uploading into the IDOL system or can be adjusted after the file has been uploaded within the IDOL portal.

Keep in mind that requirements for the IDOL CPR upload may change over time. It is the responsibility of the Contractor and Administrator to follow and meet the regulations set forth by the IDOL.

Illinois Department of Labor Resources

Pursuant to PA 100-1177 and 820 ILCS 130/5.1, the Illinois Department of Labor is charged with developing and maintaining an online portal for prevailing wage construction contractors to file their certified payrolls with the department.

As of September 1, 2020, all work performed on new and existing projects must have certified payroll reports (CPRs) filed online with IDOL by the 15th of each month for all Illinois State public works projects.

Below are links or information to resource material published by the Illinois Department of Labor. LCPcertified will attempt to maintain links to the most current information on the IDOL website, but we recommend verifying legislation or resource material directly with the IDOL.

Any questions on utilizing the IDOL Certified Transcript of Payroll Portal to register and submit certified payrolls should also be directed to IDOL.

Click here to find information on the IDOL’s website on the Prevailing Wage Act, including how to access current Prevailing Wage rates and legislation.

Click here to find out more information on the IDOL website as well as to view requirements for data collection.

Administrative Code, 56 Ill. Adm. Code 100 (Legislative Website)  

See the law, 820ILCS130/0.01-12 (Legislative Website)

Creating or Accessing an Illinois Public ID Account

You will need to create an Illinois Public ID Account to submit CPR into the Certified Transcript of Payroll Portal. Please click here to create your new account or recover your password or username.

After your account has been created, you will navigate to the Certified Transcript of Payroll Portal and select ‘Public Account’ and login using the username/password created.

Further instructions will be provided throughout the prevailing wage portal to assist you with the process.

IDOL Training Videos and Guides

IDOL has training material, including written material and video recordings, to learn how to access and file certified payroll online through the portal. Training material can be found on this IDOL webpage.

By using LCPcertified, you will be able to upload much of your payroll information through a CSV file.

Validating an Address with the USPS

It is especially important to validate that the company address is deliverable address against the USPS database for any address submitted to the IDOL portal.

LCPcertified requires that Employee Addresses be validated within the system, but at the present time, the Contractor and Project addresses must be validated by users prior to entering them into LCPcertified.

To check if an address is valid against USPS, go to the USPS website and follow these steps:

• Enter the address into the USPS fields
• If multiple options are returned, select what is appropriate
• Next to the address returned, click on the arrow to the right to view more information
• Look down to the bottom to view the DPV Confirmation Indicator. If this shows ‘N’ you do not have a valid address and will need to update it.
• A return of ‘Y, D or S’ will be valid for the IDOL purposes.

REMINDER: if the ‘DPV Confirmation Indicator’ shows ‘N’ you do not have a valid address and will need to update it.

A return of ‘Y, D or S’ will be valid for the IDOL purposes.

LCPcertified Plus

Set Up

Below are the overall steps to take to, verify your data in LCPcertified to prepare for a successful upload into  the IDOL Certified Transcript of Payroll Portal, and what to do after certifying your payroll in LCPcertified.

More detailed information on these steps can be found in the following sections of this guide.

1. Verify your company information in LCPcertified.
2. Verify your company address is a valid, deliverable address to USPS.
3. Verify IDOL-required Employee Set Up information for all your employees.
4. Submit payroll normally in LCPcertified.
5. After a weekly payroll is certified, an export file will generate that can then be uploaded to the IDOL Certified Transcript of Payroll Portal. Learn about generating the file here.
6. Log into the IDOL Certified Transcript of Payroll Portal and upload the CSV file as directed. See information above on creating an account and accessing the portal.
7. Once logged into the IDOL Certified Transcript of Payroll Portal, correct any information as needed.
8. You will also need to fill out and submit the “Fringe Benefit Affidavit”. The template and directions for upload can be found within the portal. Any questions on this should be directed to IDOL.
9. Contractors will verify a Statement of Compliance in the IDOL portal to complete a CPR submission.

Verifying Company Information

Verify that the following fields have been entered properly into LCPcertified for your account. These will be submitted to the Illinois Department of Labor.

Navigate to Set Up>Company Information page and enter:

1. Company Name
2. Federal Tax ID Number
3. Contact Name
4. Phone Number
5. Contact Email
6. Address (*This must be checked against the USPS website to ensure it is a valid, deliverable address).

Note:

It is especially important to ensure that your company address is a valid, deliverable address against the  USPS database. LCPcertified requires that Employee Addresses be validated within the system, but at the present time, the Contractor and Project addresses must be validated by users prior to entering them into LCPcertified. See the ‘Validating addresses in the USPS website’ section for more information on this.

Project Set Up

LCPcertfied users with existing projects in Illinois may need to add or update additional information in the Project Set Up area to meet IDOL requirements. The IDOL Portal will reject files if required information is missing from the upload file.

To update an existing project, locate the project under the Projects tab and click Edit to update information. Please view the details below to understand the IDOL data requirements.

To create a new project, click on Add New Project under the Projects tab.

The fields shown below denote those that are required to be able to upload a file into the IDOL Portal. Additional fields are required to complete a new project set up in LCPcertified in full, but these items will not appear in the IDOL Export file at this time.

1. Select ‘IL- Illinois’ for Project State.
2. Enter or update the Project Address and verify that it is a valid, deliverable address by USPS.
3. Enter or update the Awarding Body (Public Body) Address and verify that it is a valid, deliverable address by USPS:
   1. Please note that the IDOL Portal will reject a file that does not have valid addresses.
   2. Please click here to review instructions on how to validate this address on the USPS website.
4. Enter in a Project County under the CPR Details section. This should be a County in Illinois where your project is located.
   

In LCPcertified Plus, it is optional to use LCPcertified’s Rate Sheet functionality but is recommended to verify that prevailing wage amounts have been met prior to submitting to the IDOL. Check the field ‘Use Rate Sheet’ but make sure you have your rate sheet already in place before assigning it to a project. Further  information on creating rate sheets is in the next section of this guide.

Rate Sheet Set Up

LCPcertified users who wish to set up a list of Craft/Classifications and prevailing wages published by the Illinois Department of Labor, should do so prior to completing the full project set up. It is not a requirement to use Rate Sheets to create an IDOL Export file.

This set up step only needs to be done once and then can be used for all future payrolls going forward. Navigate to your Set Up tab and select Add/Edit Rate Sheets.

To create a new rate sheet, select Add Rate Sheet.

It is recommended that you name your rate sheet something that clearly distinguishes the wages for Illinois State prevailing wages.

Entering the prevailing wage rates for each craft is optional in LCPcertified, but it is highly recommended, this tool will assist in meeting the IL Dept of Labors requirements for submitting.

To locate information on the IL State Prevailing Wages, navigate to the IDOL website to locate all updated rates.

After naming your rate sheet, select Manage Wage Data to add the crafts and classifications. For the first craft/classification entered, you will need to create identifiers for your set of wages.

The screenshot below displays one way to label your wages. The Craft and Classification is what will appear on the IDOL Export file.

Once you have finished entering one craft, the system will prompt you to see if you are finished or would like to continue entering craft/classifications.

If you would like to continue, select ‘Add Another’, and simply begin typing in the next craft/classification.

Apprentices

For Apprentice Trades, it is very important that the word ‘Apprentice’ be entered in either the ‘Craft’ field or the ‘Classification’ field. This will be how the LCPcertified knows to mark the employee as an apprentice on the CSV export file.

Employee Set Up

The following fields in the Employee Set Up page are required to upload your payroll files into the IDOL Certified Transcript of Payroll Portal. This information is required by IL State legislation. See the law, 820 ILCS 130/0.01-12 (Legislative Website). In the ‘Set Up’ tab, navigate to ‘Add/Edit Employee Information’.

1. Employee Name
2. Address
3. Last four of SSN
4. Ethnicity
5. Phone
6. Gender
7. Veteran Status (Under Demographic Classifications)
8. Ethnicity-IDOL List (Under Demographic Classifications)
   

Payroll Entry & Certification    

If you are a Contractor new to LCPcertified, here is a high-level overview to the steps to enter and certify payroll into the software.

The payroll entry process has not changed for IDOL projects at this point.

The three main steps in entering and certifying CPRs in LCPcertified are completed by following the  numbered tabs.

1. Payroll Records Tab - Manually enter or upload payroll records
2. Notices Tab – Check to see if LCPcertified flagged any possible errors on your payrolls
3. Certification Tab – Complete the certification process

To begin entering payroll, navigate to the 1. Payroll Records tab, click on Enter Records if you are  manually entering payroll, or click on Upload Records if you will be using some form of upload.

For more detailed directions on entering and certifying payroll in LCPcertified, please go to the ‘Training Materials’ button on the top of each screen. Here you will find training documents and videos to assist you further.

Generating the CSV Export File

After a weekly payroll is certified, a CSV export file will generate that can then be uploaded to the IDOL Certified Transcript of Payroll Portal.

This will be found under the ‘Projects’ tab > ‘Certified Payrolls’. Any project that was set up with a state of Illinois will automatically have an ‘IDOL Export’ file generated.

Note:

Is Your Project State-Funded?

1. Currently in LCPcertified, the option to generate an IDOL Export file will appear for ANY project set up with an address in Illinois. This is regardless of the funding type associated to a project.
2. The Illinois Department of Labor only requires that CPRs be uploaded to their portal if it is a State-funded Project. Any project with solely Federal funding will not be required to submit payrolls to the  IDOL.
3. If you are unsure of the funding for your project, please speak with your Project Administrator or Prime  Contractor to help determine if CPRs submittals are needed.

Saving the File

1. Export and save the ‘IDOL Export’ file (in CSV format) to your computer or other data storage receptacle. This step needs to be completed for:
   1. Performing CPRs
   2. Non-Performing CPRs
   3. Amended CPRs
2. If you choose to open your file to review, add or edit any information, please read the section below for important things to take note of.

Verifying Your CSV Data    

Note:

• This export has a CSV file type as this is what is accepted by the IDOL portal.
• When you open this file to review, add or edit data, it will be viewable as an Excel file type (.xlsx).
• When you re-save the file, please remember to save as a CSV file type.
• LCPcertified has formatted the file so that any leading zeros on certain fields should remain intact even if the CSV file was opened and re-saved, but we recommend verifying data after upload to the IDOL portal. This might include employee last 4 of SSN (e.g., 0223) , Project Code (e.g., 0025067) or, least likely, ZIP codes.

If there are items that you find that need to be corrected, you can choose to do so in the upload file before you submit it into the DOL portal, or things can be adjusted after upload in the Portal itself.

The following are items that LCPcertified recommends reviewing, editing, or adding prior to or after upload.

LCPcertified Professional

Set Up

Below are the overall steps to take to verify your data in LCPcertified to prepare for a successful upload into  the IDOL Certified Transcript of Payroll Portal, and what to do after certifying your payroll in LCPcertified.

More detailed information on these steps can be found in the following sections of this guide.

1. Verify your company information in LCPcertified.
2. Verify your company address is a valid, deliverable address to USPS.
3. Verify IDOL-required Employee Set Up information for all your employees
4. Submit payroll normally in LCPcertified
5. After a weekly payroll is certified, an export file will generate that can then be uploaded to the IDOL Certified Transcript of Payroll Portal. Learn about generating the file here.
6. Log into the IDOL Certified Transcript of Payroll Portal and upload the CSV file as directed. See  information above on creating an account and accessing the portal.
7. Once logged into the IDOL Certified Transcript of Payroll Portal, correct any information as  needed.
8. You will also need to fill out and submit the “Fringe Benefit Affidavit”. The template and directions for upload can be found within the portal. Any questions on this should be directed to IDOL.
9. Contractors will verify a Statement of Compliance in the IDOL portal to complete a CPR submission.

Verifying Your Company Information

Please ensure that the following fields have been entered properly into LCPcertified for your account. These will be submitted to the Illinois Department of Labor.

Navigate to your Set Up Tab, then the Company Information page:

1. Company Name
2. Federal Tax ID Number
3. Contractor License No. or 10-digit Phone Number
4. Contact Name
5. Phone Number
6. Contact Email
7. Address (*This must be checked against the USPS website to ensure it is a valid, deliverable address).
8. Standard Hours Per Day and Standard Hours Per Week
9. Payroll System or Service

Note:

It is especially important to ensure that your company address is a valid, deliverable address against the USPS database. LCPcertified requires that Employee Addresses be validated within the system, but at the present time, the Contractor and Project addresses must be validated by users prior to entering them into LCPcertified. See the ‘Validating addresses in the USPS website’ section for more information on this.

Project Set Up

LCPcertfied users with existing projects in Illinois may need to add or update additional information in the Project Set Up area to meet IDOL requirements. The IDOL Portal will reject files if required information is missing from the upload file.

To update an existing project, locate the project under the ‘Projects’ tab and select ‘Edit’ to update information.  Please view the details below to understand the IDOL data requirements.

To create a new project, select Add New Project under the Projects tab.

The fields shown below denote those that are required to be able to upload a file into the IDOL Portal. Additional fields are required to complete a new project set up in LCPcertified in full, but these items will not appear in the IDOL Export file at this time.

1. Enter Project Name
2. Enter Project Code
3. Select Contractor on the Project or Subcontractor on the Project
4. Enter or update the Project Address and verify that it is a valid, deliverable address by USPS and select IL- Illinois for Project State
5. Select Start Date
6. Select the CPR Format
7. Select the Last Payroll Number
8. Select the Project Status
9. Enter in a Project County under the CPR Details section. This should be a County in Illinois where your project is located.
10. Enter or update the Awarding Body (Public Body) Address and verify that it is a valid, deliverable address by USPS.
    1. Note that the IDOL Portal will reject a file that does not have valid addresses.

In LCPcertified Professional, it is optional to use LCPcertified’s Rate Sheet functionality, but is recommended to verify that prevailing wage amounts have been met prior to submitting to the IDOL. Check the field Use Rate Sheet but make sure you have your rate sheet already in place before assigning it to a project.

Further information on creating rate sheets is in the next section of this guide.

Rate Sheet Set Up (Professional)    

LCPcertified users who wish to set up a list of Craft/Classifications and prevailing wages published by the Illinois Department of Labor, should do so prior to completing the full project set up. It is not a requirement to use Rate Sheets to create an IDOL Export file.

This set up step only needs to be done once and then can be used for all future payrolls going forward. Navigate to your Set Up tab and select Add/Edit Rate Sheets.

To create a new rate sheet, click on Add Rate Sheet.

It is recommended that you name your rate sheet something that clearly distinguishes the wages for Illinois State prevailing wages.

Entering the prevailing wage rates for each craft is optional in LCPcertified, but it is highly recommended, this tool will assist in meeting the IL Dept of Labors requirements for submitting.

To locate information on the IL State Prevailing Wages, please navigate to the IDOL website to locate all updated rates.

After naming your rate sheet, select ‘Manage Wage Data’ to add the crafts and classifications. For the first craft/classification entered, you will need to create identifiers for your set of wages.

The screenshot below displays one way to label your wages.

The Craft and Classification is what will appear on the IDOL Export file.

Once you have finished entering one craft, the system will prompt you to see if you are finished or would like to continue entering more craft/classifications. If you would like to continue, select ‘Add Another’, and begin entering the next craft/classification.

Apprentices

For Apprentice Trades, it is very important that the word ‘Apprentice’ be entered in either the ‘Craft’ field or  the ‘Classification’ field.

This will be how the LCPcertified knows to mark the employee as an apprentice on the CSV export file.

Employee Set Up

The following fields in the Employee Set Up page are required to upload your payroll files into the IDOL Certified Transcript of Payroll Portal. This information is required by IL State legislation. See the law, 820 ILCS 130/0.01-12 (Legislative Website).

1. Employee Name
2. Address
3. Last 4 (four) of SSN
4. Ethnicity
5. Phone Number
6. Gender
7. Demographic Type: Veteran Status under Demographic Classification
8. Ethnicity-IDOL List: under Demographic Classification
9. 

Payroll Entry & Certification

If you are a Contractor new to LCPcertified, here is a high-level overview to the steps to enter and certify  payroll into the software.

The payroll entry process has not changed for IDOL projects at this point.

The three main steps in entering and certifying CPRs in LCPcertified are completed by following the numbered tabs.

1. Payroll Records Tab - Manually enter or upload payroll records
2. Notices Tab – Check to see if LCPcertified flagged any possible errors on your payrolls
3. Certification Tab – Complete the certification process

To begin entering payroll, navigate to the 1. Payroll Records tab and select Enter Records if you are manually entering payroll, or Upload Records if you will be using some form of upload.

Generating the CSV Export File

After a weekly payroll is certified, a CSV export file can be generated that can be uploaded to the IDOL Certified Transcript of Payroll Portal.

Go to the 3. Certifications>Export Certified Payroll Report. Use filters as necessary and then select the Export Type to ‘IDOL Export’.

Note:

• Is Your Project State-Funded?
• Currently in LCPcertified, the option to generate an IDOL Export file will appear for ANY project set up with an address in Illinois. This is regardless of the funding type associated to a project.
• The Illinois Department of Labor only requires that CPRs be uploaded to their portal if it is a State-funded Project. Any project with solely Federal funding will not be required to submit payrolls to the  IDOL.
• If you are unsure of the funding for your project, please speak with your Project Administrator or Prime Contractor to help determine if CPRs submittals are needed.
  
  
  Saving the File
• Export and save the ‘IDOL Export’ file (in CSV format) to your computer or other data storage receptacle. This step needs to be completed for:
  • Performing CPRs
  • Non-Performing CPRs
  • Amended CPRs
• If you choose to open your file to review, add or edit any information, please read the section below for important things to take note of.

Verifying Your CSV Data

Note:

• This export has a CSV file type as this is what is accepted by the IDOL portal.
• When you open this file to review, add or edit data, it will be viewable as an Excel file type (.xlsx).
• When you re-save the file, please remember to save as a CSV file type.
• LCPcertified has formatted the file so that any leading zeros on certain fields should remain intact even if the CSV file was opened and re-saved, but we recommend verifying data after upload to the IDOL portal. This might include employee last 4 of SSN (e.g., 0223), Project Code (e.g., 0025067), or  least likely, ZIP codes.

If there are items that you find that need to be corrected, you can choose to do so in the upload file before you  submit it into the IDOL portal, or things can be adjusted after upload in the Portal itself.

Please refer to the schema mapping table in this document, to understand where the data is coming from within LCPcertified.

The following are items that LCPcertified recommends reviewing, editing, or adding prior to or after upload.

Should you need additional assistance on items within LCPcertified, please contact our LCPcertified support team through one of the following options:

• Email: support@LCPcertified.com
• Phone: (714) 669-0052, Option 4
• Live Chat: Click on the ‘Live Chat’ button at the top of each screen to begin a chat

Should you have questions or comments on the information collected in the IDOL portal, please contact the Illinois Department of Labor.