Ohio prevailing wage rates: A contractor's guide

Public construction work in Ohio comes with continual compliance obligations. Whether it’s a city hall renovation or a municipal infrastructure project, applying Ohio prevailing wage rates is a legal requirement, and noncompliance can lead to penalties like back wages, statutory fines, and bid bans. 

For construction payroll teams and project managers, understanding when to apply prevailing wage and how to structure it requires consistency and discipline. This guide covers everything they need to know about the state of Ohio’s prevailing wage and how to maintain compliance across public works jobs.

What is prevailing wage in Ohio?

Prevailing wage refers to the minimum hourly rate and fringe benefits employers are legally required to pay construction workers on public works projects. The laws started with the federal Davis-Bacon Act that passed in 1931. During the same decade, Ohio formally established state-specific prevailing wage requirements under Ohio Revised Code Chapter 4115. 

The Ohio Department of Commerce (DOC) sets prevailing wage rates based on Ohio labor union pay scales from local collective bargaining agreements (CBAs) and relevant wage data. Pay and fringe benefit requirements change based on each worker’s job classification and location. Each week, contractors must also submit certified payroll reports to confirm compliance.

Which projects are subject to the Ohio prevailing wage?

Ohio prevailing wage rules apply to public improvement projects funded by state or local governments. Even if the government only pays for some of a project, such as a public grant layered onto a private development, prevailing wage applies to the entire project.

However, the total budget must exceed certain dollar thresholds to qualify. The Director of the DOC adjusts these thresholds every two years based on construction cost index data, with a change cap of 3% per year to prevent sudden economic swings.

Here are common examples of public improvement projects and their respective threshold triggers in Ohio:

• New construction: Once new construction reaches $250,000 or more, firms must follow prevailing wage requirements from the first dollar of labor. This is the most common trigger on public business projects.
• Reconstruction, renovation, repair, or painting: This category includes mid-sized public projects, such as school renovations and facility upgrades, that reach $75,000 or more. Many payroll teams don’t initially flag these projects as prevailing wage work, which makes them a common compliance hurdle.
• Roads, bridges, sewers, and alleys: This category of public infrastructure projects (horizontal projects) faces two triggers: $101,201 for new construction and $30,320 for repairs or reconstruction. Since the reconstruction threshold is much lower, payroll teams often overlook prevailing wage requirements for routine maintenance and utility repairs.

How to find your Ohio prevailing wage rate determination

When evaluating prevailing wage rates for a project, keep the following in mind:

• Prevailing wage rates are specific to each scenario: Before a project goes out to bid, the public authority asks for a prevailing wage determination from the Bureau of Wage and Hour Administration. The rate is then included in the bid documents and project specifications.
• Rates depend on county and classification: Prevailing wage rates differ based on the trade classification of each worker and where they perform the work. The Ohio DOC outlines per-county rates.
• Rates lock in at the bid or award date: The rate is established at the time of the initial bid or when the contract is awarded, and it applies throughout the entire duration of the project.
• Firms may need to manage multiple rate schedules at once: On projects with mixed funding, payroll teams may need to track both Ohio’s state prevailing wage rates and federal Davis-Bacon rates, paying whichever is higher for each classification. Active jobs may have different wage tables that payroll teams need to manage simultaneously.

What’s included in Ohio prevailing wage rates?

Prevailing wage covers the entire compensation package, so payroll teams need to consider multiple components to stay compliant. These include the following.

Base hourly rate

The base hourly rate is the minimum wage for each hour someone has worked on a job. It’s determined by the county and the specific worker’s trade classification. 

Two crew members, one performing electrical work and another installing an HVAC system, in Franklin County can have different hourly rates under the same job contract. Similarly, a carpenter installing cabinetry in Cuyahoga may have a different rate than a worker doing the same task in Hamilton.

Fringe benefits

The DOC requires employers to offer fringe benefits as part of the total prevailing wage compensation package. Common fringe benefits include:

• Health insurance
• Life insurance
• Paid leave (vacation, holiday, illness)
• Apprenticeship and training fund contributions

Contractors must calculate fringes based on the hours worked for each job classification. Firms can pay them as direct bona fide benefits packages or as a cash equivalent in addition to base wages. Keep in mind that paying direct non-cash benefits goes toward fringe credits, which can reduce payroll taxes.

Overtime rules

When a crew member works more than 40 hours in a single workweek, the additional hours beyond that 40 must be paid at 1.5 times their base hourly rate. Note that if workers earn multiple different rates during the week, payroll teams need to base overtime calculations on the blended rate. However, fringe benefits are always paid at a consistent rate for every hour, even for overtime.

Apprentice pay rates

Contractors must pay registered apprentices a percentage of the journeyman rate, which is based on their program progression. Firms need to verify the apprenticeship and pay the correct percentage rate while also maintaining the proper apprentice-to-journeyman ratio on the jobsite.

Information required in Ohio certified payroll reports

Ohio requires contractors to submit certified payroll reports on every covered public project for each pay period. Payroll teams must also use a specific certified payroll format that’s different from the federal WH-347 form.

Here’s how the process works:

• Subcontractors submit payroll reports at each pay period to the general contractor (GC). 
• The GC files each report with the Prevailing Wage Coordinator. The first report is due within 14 days of the first pay period, and reports continue weekly for jobs of four months or less, or monthly for longer projects.

Here’s what a certified payroll report should include in Ohio:

• Identifying employee information: This must include name, address, and the last four digits of the worker’s SSN number.
• Job classification and hours worked: The classification must match the rate for each task and hour worked in the week. Mismatches are one of the most common compliance flags.
• Hourly rate and fringe benefits: The base hourly rate and fringes must be itemized and separate.
• Total wages paid: The gross wages for each worker for the pay period have to match reported hours and rates.
• Signed certification: The contractor or an authorized appointed agent must certify that the wages meet or exceed the prevailing wage minimum.
• Employee notification: Contractors must notify employees not covered in a CBA with a written description of their classification and prevailing wage rate, along with the name of the Prevailing Wage Coordinator.

Penalties for prevailing wage violations in Ohio

Ohio maintains strict enforcement of prevailing wage, and failing to meet payroll compliance requirements can lead to penalties. The severity depends on whether regulators deem the violation intentional.

Penalties may include:

• Workers recover unpaid wages: Underpaid employees can claim the full difference between what they were paid and the prevailing wage, and they have 90 days from the Director of Commerce’s determination to file a lawsuit.
• Mandatory penalties on top of backpay: When a court finds an employer underpaid an employee, it must award the employee the shortfall plus a 25% penalty, and the employer must separately pay a 75% penalty to the director of commerce’s enforcement fund. Combined, total liability can reach 200% of the underpayment.
• Legal fees and court costs: When an employee wins a claim, the employer must cover attorney fees and court expenses.
• Debarment from future public work: rs found to have committed intentional violations can be barred from bidding on public improvements for up to three years.

How Miter supports Ohio prevailing wage compliance

Payroll teams that oversee prevailing wage jobs often have to deal with complex manual calculations. They also have to allocate fringes every pay period, keep rate tables for every classification and county, and submit weekly certified payroll, all while navigating strict compliance rules.

Miter is a purpose-built construction software platform that simplifies payroll and helps teams maintain labor compliance across the board. The platform digitizes a county’s pay rate determination once, and then automatically applies the correct rate (including fringes and overtime) to the correct classification. Payroll teams can also automatically convert fringes into hourly equivalents and offset them against requirements.

Firms can enter rate changes in advance, track prevailing wage rates across Ohio, utilize employee-level controls, and generate certified payroll reports directly from payroll data to avoid weekly manual processing.

Miter’s Payroll and Compliance solutions save teams hours of manual labor.