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North Dakota Unemployment Insurance Update

January 1st, 2007 Posted by Mark

In North Dakota, the state officials give new employers 20 days to get their act together and file with them after they first start employing people. That means from the first day of your first employee, you have about three weeks to file with the North Dakota unemployment insurance system to see if you are liable to pay unemployment insurance taxes.

Then once the state determines that you are liable, you have to file a form called the Employer’s Contribution and Wage Reports, each and every quarter that you are liable for unemployment insurance payments. You can do this online at the North Dakota government Web site for those of us in the 21st century when it comes to technology. You can even make payments from your company account through electronic funds transfer. The forms and the payments must be made by the end of the month following the end of the quarter. If you’re late, state officials reserve the right to charge you a penalty fee as well as interest on your taxes.

As in some of the other states that we have looked at, in North Dakota new employers are charged at first the “new employer” tax rate. This rate lasts for at least six quarters if you are a non construction employer, for 10 quarters if you are a construction related employer. After that time period, then you get what is called the experience rated tax rate. That rate is based on how well you performed in the previous year—meaning how well you paid your taxes (on time and to the full amount) and how many of your former employees had been getting unemployment benefits.

If you are not necessarily a new employer but the new owners of a previous business that you bought or acquired, you can ask to have the experience rating tax rate from the previous owner if it was a good one. But if you get that rating, you are also held liable for any benefits payments that that previous owner was making to laid off workers.