LCA
FAXBACK DO'S AND DON'TS
October 23, 2000 The Department of Labor’s FaxBack system has been experiencing numerous problems since its implementation. In order to assure that you get the best and fastest results from use of the system, DOL has recommended that the following steps be taken:
7. Please remember to put in a number in the Employer Control Number box on the LCA faxback form. Do not put in a series of ones or 12345, etc. If you do not have an internal Employer Control Number, put in the time (hour, minutes seconds) or date and time. Do not leave this blank, or your LCA will not be approved. 8. Faxback users are still sending in cover sheets, G-28's and prevailing wage determinations on the fax back line. These will not be read by the system and will result in a failed faxback. 9. A very big problem is that users are reversing the return fax number and the contact telephone number. This causes DOL to be unable to send out the approved LCA form, and engenders a call from a human being at DOL to try and figure out what the right fax number is. It is not clear how long DOL will be able to keep up that level of "customer service." In any event, this mistake uses up precious staff time that could be used by DOL on other projects. Please review your LCA's to make sure the fax number is on the right section. 10. Do not put in any dashes or other punctuation on the FEIN number section. The system can't read these, and you won't have room for the whole number. 11. Do not use the Occupational Outlook Handbook as a wage source on an LCA. 12. Under City and State on the form, be sure you actually fill in a city and state. Do not put in "same as above." The system is designed to recognize only a city name and a state code. 13. Don't use nonexistent dates, like April 31, for example. The system rejects them. 14. The system is designed to reject any wage that is not above 95% of prevailing. Therefore, if your actual wage is exactly 95% of prevailing, but not above, the LCA will most likely be rejected. If the employer is paying 95% of the prevailing wage, have the employer raise the wage by at least a penny to ensure acceptance of the faxback form. 15. Do not fax the form to the employer for signature. Ask the employer to fax it back to you, and then fax it to the faxback number. If not, this will result in a severe distortion of the image of the page that will be unreadable by the system. 16. The best set-up to have for receiving faxback LCA's is a 24-hour dedicated fax line for LCA's. Of course, this may not be feasible for everyone. It is advantageous because the LCA faxback system sends back the approved LCA's often after hours or on weekends. The system will make seven tries at a number and then give up. If you do not have a dedicated fax line and your fax machine is shut off, or runs out of paper on the weekend, you may not get your fax. Also, do not provide a return fax number that doubles as a voice mail number. Again, if a human or tape recording answers, the system will give up after seven tries. Then DOL must use staff time to get the LCA to the right fax number. Again, we don't know how much longer they will be able to do this. Finally, remember that you are sending material to a computer that reads data, not a human. If you are not completing the form properly, or you are sending out extraneous material, the computer will simply not recognize it as an LCA. Review your faxback forms properly before sending them to the Faxback line.
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