I work with mostly spanish speaking employees and have always tried to provide information in spanish to accomodate their needs.

Am I legally required to provide information in spanish? English is our official language, is it not?

Thank you,

Karen

No, it is not. The US does not have an official language.

Michael can correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that in CA (and in many other states with a high Hispanic population) you are required to provide any materials that are legally required (such as labor law posters) in Spanish. Whether you choose to provide them for non-legally required documents, such as an employee handbook, is up to you. However, it would seem to me that common sense would dictate that if you do not provide documentation in the language understood by most of your employees, you have only yourself to blame if you have a high incidence of employees violating policies or making mistakes because they did not understand what they were supposed to do.

In other words, taking a little trouble now (to provide Spanish-language materials) can save you a lot of trouble later.

If you work in the private sector, no, you aren't required to provide comapny documents to them in Spanish but you will be doing a great disservice to the company if you don't.

1. Your employes aren't going to be nearly as productive (or loyal) as they would otherwise be if they can't understand what they're supposed to do, what the quality standards and work instructions are, and so on.

2. You could find yourself in a legal bind if your employees don't understand your company's policies because they aren't conversant in English. How are you going to demonstrate that an employee is aware of your sexual harassment policy if they don't speak or read English and your handbook is only in English?

I have a sizeable group of non- or limited-English speaking employees and yes, it's more trouble and expense to have things translated, but it's certainly worth it in the short-run and the long-run.

The Washington Post had a very good story yesterday about how a large grocery store (Wegmans) has improved safety and food handling standards by providing information in a foreign languages to its employees. It sounds like it makes good business sense to do so.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/11/AR2005121100634.html

Many California postings are required in both English and Spanish. In general the ones that are required in both (if spanish speaking workers are presnet) are minimum wage, workers compensation, and safety regulations.

As far as non-required postings, it could be argued that you are required to provide some information in Spanish. This is because the employer must provide a safe working environment. Thus, if you know the worker does not speak English, but you give her an instruction manual to a complex machine in English, this would likely result in liability.