SUPPORTING STATEMENT FOR
PAPERWORK REDUCTION ACT SUBMISSION
Employment
Application for Locally Employed Staff or
Family Member
OMB
Control Number 1405-0189
DS-174
A. JUSTIFICATION
Why is this collection necessary and what are the legal statutes that allow this?
Candidates for employment at U.S. Embassies, Consulates or Missions abroad are required to complete and submit the Application for Employment as a Locally Employed Staff or Family Member (DS-0174) in order to meet the requirements for worldwide Mission recruitment. The form solicits information needed by Mission Management (specifically Human Resources (HR)) to assess eligibility, qualifications, and selection for employment. Authority for the Department to collect this information is under Sections 103,105, 206, 301(c), 303, 311(b), 408, and 501 of the Foreign Service Act of 1980 (as amended) and under 22 U.S.C. 2269(c)..
What business purpose is the information gathered going to be used for?
The Office of Overseas Employment (HR/OE) requires that applicants for employment abroad complete and submit this form. The information collected is used by HR to determine a candidate’s eligibility for employment in the host country, eligibility as a U.S. Citizen Eligible Family Member (USEFM), eligibility as a U.S. Veteran USEFM, and qualifications for the Mission advertised position. Mission HR uses the information on the form to establish basic personnel records once the candidate is hired.
Is this collection able to be completed electronically (e.g. through a website or application)?
The collection will be completed electronically via the Electronic Recruitment Application (ERA) which is linked directly from the Mission’s internet site. Each Mission has their own ERA URL for applicants to apply. For example for Afghanistan, the URL is https://erajobs.state.gov/dos-era/afg/vacancysearch/searchVacancies.hms. A small number of applicants are able to submit the DS-0174 via email or postal services. Globally, Missions receive approximately one million applications. Currently 80% of the collection is electronic and it is expected to increase to 95% by the end of 2019 as deployment of the ERA is completed.
Does this collection duplicate any other collection of information?
There is no duplication of this information request.
Describe any impacts on small business.
There is no impact on small business.
What are consequences if this collection is not done?
If this collection is not conducted, it would be impossible for Human Resources at the Embassy, Consulate, or Mission to identify the required minimum eligibility and qualifications requirements for each vacancy and to make a selection for employment. Missions overseas currently have approximately 60,000 Locally Employed Staff who support the Missions efforts.
Are there any special collection circumstances?
No special circumstances exist.
Document publication (or intent to publish) a request for public comments in the Federal Register
On February 1, 2019, the Department published a notice in the Federal Register (84 FR 1263) soliciting public comments for a period of 60 days. No comments were received. The Department will publish a notice in the Federal Register for a period of 30 days.
Are payments or gifts given to the respondents?
Payments or gifts are not given to the respondents.
Describe assurances of privacy/confidentiality
For ERA submissions, the DS-0174 is stored on a server in the United States maintained by the contractor, Monster Government Solutions, and in compliance with Department’s ISSO standards. For paper submissions, they are stored at Post and maintained or destroyed in compliance with Department standards. If the Mission hires the candidate, the DS-0174 becomes part of the new employee’s Official Personnel File (OPF). The form contains Privacy Act statements that comply with and contain information required by the Foreign Service Act of 1980 (as amended) and 22 USC 2669(c).
Are any questions of a sensitive nature asked?
This form does not request information of a sensitive nature.
Describe the hour time burden and the hour cost burden on the respondent needed to complete this collection
The Department anticipates approximately 1,000,000 applicants per year. This is based on the survey results of the average number of applicants received per vacancy as self-identified on the Local Compensation Questionnaire as conducted annually by HR/OE. The estimated burden for completion of the DS-0174 is expected to be about 45 minutes. 1,000,000 applicants X 45 minutes/60 minutes = 750,000 hours. From the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the “all occupations” wage rate is $24.98 per hour. $24.98 x 750,000 hours = $18,735,5001.
Describe the monetary burden to respondents (out of pocket costs) needed to complete this collection.
There is no cost to the respondents.
Describe the cost incurred by the Federal Government to complete this collection.
The cost to the Federal government is approximately $2,000,000 per year to pay for the Electronic Recruitment Application (ERA) software. This is the price of the contract signed by the Bureau of Human Resources and Monster Government Solutions to provide the ERA software. The previous estimate of $907,000 was the estimate for receiving all of the applications via fax, mail, or electronic mail and the labor required to process the applications. In addition, the HR Specialist at each overseas Post would review only the top 10 applicants received through ERA given that they are already scored by ERA. The time to review 10 application is 40 minutes. The HR Specialist would review the application and prepare the short list for the supervisors review during this time. The average yearly salary for LE Staff overseas 2 is $33,378 so the hourly rate is $16.08 per hour. So the cost for each LE Staff to review the 10 applications is $16.08 x 40/60 which equals $10.72 per vacancy announcement. Assuming approximately 9000 vacancy announcements each year, the average annual cost to review applications through the ERA is $96,480. Therefore, the total cost to the Federal government is approximately ($96,480 + $2,000,000).
Explain any changes/adjustments to this collection since the previous submission
Since the previous submission in 2017, there have been no changes to the form. For those posts that have implemented ERA, the form has become electronic. The applicant does not need to print the form; hence the reduction of the time needed to fill out the form, from one hour to fifteen minutes. ERA implementation began in June 2017 and the Department should have full implementation of ERA by December 2019. In particular, the complexity of the form has been reduced requiring less retrieval of phone numbers from previous employers, and the documents required for inclusion of the application has been significantly reduced.
At the time of the last renewal, overseas employment was experiencing a hiring freeze which limited the number of positions that required recruitment to those that met health and safety considerations. In addition, HR/OE employed a new tool to extrapolate the number of applicants more accurately, hence the increase from 40,000 to 1 million applicants. Accessing the DS-0174 is now electronic and does not require the applicant to print, copy, mail or duplicate documents; instead they are able to access the application via ERA from their phone, computer or laptop. The applicant is able to take photographs of their documents and easily upload to the application, hence the decrease in the cost for the respondents. Finally, the increase in cost for the Federal Government was due to automating the applicant management system using ERA by using the software by Monster Government Systems. The State Department has been using similar software (known as USAJOBS) domestically for some time and this software was adapted to become ERA for the overseas Embassy, Consulates, and Missions.
Specify if the data gathered by this collection will be published.
The information collected will not be used for statistical purposes or publication.
If applicable, explain the reason(s) for seeking approval to not display the OMB expiration date.
The Department will display the OMB expiration date.
Explain any exceptions to the OMB certification statement below.
The Department is not seeking exceptions to the certification statement.
B. COLLECTION OF INFORMATION EMPLOYING STATISTICAL METHODS
This collection does not employ statistical methods.
1 Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics. The mean for all occupations was attained from the “All Occupational Employment Statistics” 2018 data, https://www.bls.gov/oes/special.requests/oesm18all.zip
2 Global average salary derived from https://www.averagesalarysurvey.com/search/country/
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| File Modified | 0000-00-00 |
| File Created | 0000-00-00 |