Certified Payroll Reporting: The Complete 2026 Guide to WH-347 Compliance

If you've ever filled out Form WH-347 by hand, you know the pain. Columns of employee data. Trade classifications that change by project. Prevailing wage rates that vary by county and year. Fringe benefit calculations that have to be exact — not close, exact.

One wrong number and you get a letter from the Department of Labor. Or worse: your payments get withheld, your contract gets flagged, and you spend the next 6 months explaining yourself in an audit.

This guide covers everything you need to know about certified payroll reporting in 2026 — and shows you how iSolved People Cloud handles it automatically, from the moment an employee clocks in at a job site to the moment the WH-347 hits the agency's desk.

What Is Certified Payroll?

Certified payroll is a weekly payroll report that contractors and subcontractors must submit on construction projects covered by the Davis-Bacon Act (federal projects over $2,000) or state prevailing wage laws. The standard form is the WH-347, issued by the U.S. Department of Labor.

The report certifies that every worker on the project was paid at least the prevailing wage rate for their trade classification in that geographic area — including fringe benefits.

It's not optional. It's not a suggestion. It's a legal requirement with real penalties.

What Form WH-347 Requires: Field by Field

Each weekly WH-347 submission must include:

Who Must File: The Entire Chain

This is where many contractors get caught. Certified payroll isn't just for the general contractor. Every tier of subcontractor on a covered project must file:

• Prime/General Contractor — files their own reports AND collects all sub reports
• First-tier subcontractors — must file for their employees
• Second-tier and below — each sub must file for their workers
• Staffing agencies & labor brokers — if their workers are on-site, they file too

The GC is ultimately responsible for ensuring all reports are submitted. If a sub doesn't file, the GC is on the hook. This is why many GCs now require electronic certified payroll submission through platforms like LCPtracker, Elation Systems, or direct agency portals.

The 7 Most Expensive Certified Payroll Mistakes

After 10 years of processing certified payroll for contractors across Georgia, Florida, and Indiana, we've seen every mistake in the book. Here are the ones that cost real money:

1. Wrong Work Classifications

Listing an employee as a "Laborer" when they're performing carpentry work means you're paying the wrong prevailing wage rate. The DOL doesn't care what your internal job title says — they care about the actual work being performed. If a worker performs work in more than one classification during a week, hours must be split by classification.

2. Fringe Benefit Math Errors

The prevailing wage has two components: the base hourly rate and the fringe benefit rate. You can pay fringe as cash, contribute it to bona fide plans (health, pension, vacation), or split it. But the math has to add up exactly. A miscalculation of even $0.10/hour across a crew of 20 for 6 months becomes a $5,000+ back-wage liability.

3. Missing Daily Hour Breakdowns

WH-347 requires hours for each day of the week, not just the weekly total. "40 hours" isn't enough — you need "8, 8, 8, 8, 8, 0, 0" or the actual daily split. This is where time tracking becomes critical.

4. Overtime Calculation Errors

On prevailing wage projects, overtime is calculated at 1.5x the base hourly rate — NOT 1.5x the total prevailing wage (base + fringe). Many contractors overpay OT, which sounds generous but actually creates reporting inconsistencies that trigger audits.

5. Not Filing for "No Work" Weeks

If your crew didn't work on a covered project during a particular week, you still may need to file a "no work performed" report. Agencies differ on this requirement, but failing to file creates gaps that look like missing reports during an audit.

6. Late Submissions

Reports are typically due within 7 days after the end of each pay period. Late submissions can result in withheld contract payments. For a GC managing 15 subcontractors, one late sub report can hold up payments for the entire project.

7. Unsigned Statement of Compliance

Page 2 of the WH-347 is the Statement of Compliance. It requires a signature and date from an authorized officer of the company. An unsigned report is the same as no report. It sounds trivial, but it happens constantly with manual processes.

The Real Cost of Non-Compliance

How iSolved Automates Certified Payroll: The Complete Workflow

This is where we talk about the solution. iSolved People Cloud includes a native Certified Payroll Reporting module — not a bolt-on, not a third-party integration. It's built into the same platform that handles your time tracking, payroll processing, and tax filing.

Here's how the workflow works, end to end:

Step 1: Time Entry with Project & Classification Tagging

When employees enter time — either through the iSolved Time Entry Grid or the dedicated Certified Payroll Entry screen — each entry is tagged with:

• Project/Job Code — which job site
• Work Classification — the DOL trade type (e.g., "Journeyman Electrician")
• Cost Code — the phase or task within the project

For field workers, time can be captured via the iSolved mobile app with GPS clock-in, so you get verified location data alongside hour tracking. This creates an audit trail that proves the employee was actually on the job site during the hours reported.

Step 2: Automatic Prevailing Wage Rate Application

Here's where manual processes always break down. iSolved maintains prevailing wage rate tables that are configured by project. When time is entered against a covered project, the system automatically:

• Applies the correct prevailing wage rate for that classification in that location
• Separates the base rate from the fringe benefit rate
• Calculates fringe benefit credits from employer-paid health, pension, and vacation plans
• Determines any cash-in-lieu of fringe payments owed to the employee
• Handles split classifications when an employee works multiple trades in one week

Step 3: Payroll Processing with Built-in Validation

During payroll processing, iSolved runs automated validation checks on all certified payroll data:

• Are all required classifications populated?
• Do the pay rates meet or exceed the prevailing wage for each classification?
• Are fringe benefits properly allocated?
• Are overtime calculations correct (1.5x base rate, not total rate)?
• Are daily hour breakdowns complete for each employee?

If something doesn't check out, the system flags it before payroll is finalized — not after you've already submitted the WH-347 and the DOL is asking questions.

Step 4: WH-347 Report Generation

Once payroll is finalized, generating the certified payroll report takes one click. iSolved pulls all the validated data and produces:

• Federal WH-347 in the exact DOL-approved format
• State-specific certified payroll forms (California DIR, New York, Washington, and others)
• Reports in PDF for manual submission or XML/CSV for electronic filing
• The Statement of Compliance (page 2) pre-populated and ready for signature

Step 5: Electronic Filing & Third-Party Integration

For contractors who need to file electronically, iSolved exports certified payroll data in formats compatible with:

• LCPtracker — the most widely used certified payroll compliance platform
• Elation Systems — another popular compliance tracking tool
• California DIR — direct electronic submission for state projects
• Agency-specific portals — many state DOTs and federal agencies have their own upload systems

No re-keying. No exporting to Excel and reformatting. The data flows directly from payroll to the compliance platform.

State-Level Requirements: GA, FL, and IN

Federal Davis-Bacon is just the baseline. Your state may have additional requirements:

Manual vs. Automated: The Time & Cost Comparison

For a contractor running 5 covered projects simultaneously, that's the difference between 15-25 hours per week on compliance paperwork versus 75 minutes. That's an employee's entire job, freed up to focus on actual construction.

The OBBBA Overtime Angle for Construction

The One Big Beautiful Bill Act's new overtime tax deduction adds another layer for certified payroll. Construction workers commonly earn significant overtime, and the new deduction allows employees to exclude up to $12,500 of FLSA overtime premium from federal income tax.

For certified payroll, this means:

• Overtime on prevailing wage projects must be calculated correctly (1.5x base rate only)
• FLSA overtime must be tracked separately from voluntary OT or premium pay
• W-2s need Box 12 Code TT for qualified overtime amounts
• iSolved handles this tracking and W-2 reporting automatically

Read our complete OBBBA overtime guide →

FAQ

What is Form WH-347?

Form WH-347 is the standard certified payroll report required by the U.S. Department of Labor on federally funded construction projects exceeding $2,000. It documents weekly payroll data including employee names, work classifications, hours worked daily, pay rates, deductions, and fringe benefits. Page 2 contains a Statement of Compliance that must be signed by an authorized company officer.

How often must certified payroll be submitted?

Certified payroll reports must be submitted weekly for each active covered project. Reports are typically due within 7 days after the end of each payroll period. Contractors must retain all certified payroll records for a minimum of 3 years after the project is completed.

What happens if my reports are late or inaccurate?

Consequences escalate from withheld contract payments (most common) to back wage assessments, civil penalties up to $2,782 per violation, debarment from federal contracts for up to 3 years, and in cases of willful fraud, criminal prosecution.

Can iSolved generate WH-347 reports automatically?

Yes. iSolved People Cloud includes a native Certified Payroll Reporting module that generates WH-347 forms automatically from payroll and time entry data. It handles prevailing wage rate application, fringe benefit calculations, multi-classification tracking, and supports electronic filing to agencies like California DIR and platforms like LCPtracker and Elation Systems.

Do subcontractors need to file certified payroll?

Yes. Every tier of subcontractor on a Davis-Bacon covered project must submit certified payroll reports for their employees. The general contractor is responsible for collecting and submitting all subcontractor reports, making compliance a chain-wide requirement.

What if my employees work on both covered and non-covered projects in the same week?

Hours and wages must be reported separately for each project. Prevailing wage rates apply only to work on covered projects. iSolved handles this split automatically — the same employee can have different rates applied to different projects within a single pay period.