Built for the people who actually do the paperwork.
Rate & Fringe is an independent, educational resource on union payroll, fringe, and prevailing wage, for union contractors, the payroll teams behind them, and open-shop contractors on public jobs too.
Why Rate & Fringe exists
Prevailing wage rules aren't impossible. But the official sources are dense, the answers you find online often conflict, and the cost of getting it wrong lands on the contractor. Rate & Fringe takes one topic at a time and explains it the way you'd explain it to a new hire in the field office: what the rule is for, how it usually works, where people get tripped up, and where to check the source.
What we believe
Plain beats polished.
If it can't be explained simply, we haven't done our job yet.
Show the source.
We link to the regulations and agency guidance so you can check our work.
Union payroll at the core, everyone welcome.
Most of what we dig into comes from the union side: CBAs, locals, funds, and fund audits. Open-shop contractors on public jobs are welcome here too, and a lot of the prevailing wage rules are the same for everybody.
No scare tactics.
Compliance is a process, not a panic.
Say when it depends.
A lot of the time it does, and we'll tell you what it depends on.
Rate & Fringe with Larry Horner
Larry Horner, Founder
The Certified Payroll Guy
Larry Horner has worked in payroll since 2004. He started at ADP, working with small business, mid-market, and national accounts. In 2012 he moved to a payroll firm focused on contractors, and he kept running into the same problem: payroll providers that said they could handle union and prevailing wage work but couldn't. Certified payroll came back wrong, fringes were reported wrong, and job costing never matched the jobs.
Today Larry is an expert in union and prevailing wage payroll, including certified payroll reporting, prevailing wage benefit reporting, union reporting, and job costing. He also handles complex payroll outside construction, for manufacturers, nonprofits, and large organizations. Rate & Fringe is where he explains it all in plain English.
Independence & editorial standards
Rate & Fringe is an independent brand. It's not a government agency and isn't affiliated with or endorsed by any agency, union, trade association, or software company. Content is written for education. If that ever changes, for example through a sponsorship or a paid offering, we'll say so clearly on the content it affects.
Corrections
Rules change, and we can get things wrong. If you spot an error or something out of date, email info@rateandfringe.com. We'll review it and update the content with a note showing what changed.