Template: new-hire packet index (every document in the personnel file, who completes it, when, and how long it is kept)
In one paragraph
The personnel file is where every deadline in this phase ends up as a piece of paper, and the file is only useful if the same sixteen documents are in the same order for every employee. This index is the cover sheet: each document, who fills it in, the deadline, where the original lives (personnel file, the separate I-9 binder, the truck binder, or the payroll service), and how long it is kept, with the section that sets the period. Beside the blank, the index for Rigo Ávila's file at Salcedo Electric on his 30th day, every line filled or marked not applicable.
The rule
The personnel file holds the 2810.5 notice, the tax withholding forms, the IIPP training record (kept at least one year under 8 CCR 3203(b)(2)), the electrician certification or trainee registration and supervision attestation (Labor Code 108.2(j), 108.4), the sick leave and timekeeping acknowledgments, and the pay records the employer must keep at least three years (Labor Code 226(a), 1174(d)); Form I-9 is kept separately for three years after hire or one year after termination, whichever is later (8 CFR 274a.2); employment tax records are kept at least four years (IRS); and job-related records fall under CSLB's five-year rule (B&P 7111).
Why it matters
A Labor Commissioner conference, a Cal/OSHA visit, an EDD audit and a CSLB investigation each ask for a different subset of the same folder. If the folder is built the same way every time, the answer to all four is the folder. If it is not, each becomes a search, and the searches happen in the weeks you can least afford them.